Blood is not family
by Arawn D. Draven
Summary: Left a Squib when Voldemort was vanquished, Harry Potter is left with the Dursleys with a letter stressing he cannot use magic. However, things go awry and he finds himself with another gift, and abandoned. Found by Harlan Wade, what will happen now? Graphic content, you are warned!
1. Chapter 1

**Helllloooo ladies and gentlemen! Here is a one-shot I wrote some time ago, while looking for some information about F.E.A.R. I have NEVER played the game, so everything I used was what I found on the official wikia. I was actually a bit surprised by how well the timelines could be merged, as Harry is born in 1980 in canon, and Alma was born somewhere in 1979.**

 **Anyway, this story will have three parts. The story, the Good End, and the Bad End. I'm still working on the Bad End so it won't be out before tomorrow at the very best, so for now bear with the story and the Good End.**

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 **I don't own Harry Potter or F.E.A.R.**

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 **Blood is not family**

 **November 31st, 1981**

Albus Dumbledore, Leader of the Light and Headmaster of Hogwarts among his many titles, stared sadly at the small bundle he was going to leave to the Dursleys. The aged man was one of the most powerful wizards in the world, and yet for all his knowledge of magic, there was nothing he could do for the currently sleeping baby.

When the Dark Lord Voldemort had attacked the Potters, planning to kill both twins, Sirius Charlus Potter and Harry James Potter, he had unexplainably been defeated, despite it hardly being the first time the madman had killed toddlers. Still, there was the Prophecy to account for, so he had made sure to check both boys to determine which one was the Chosen One, the one who would vanquish the Dark Lord once and for all. It had been immediately obvious to him that Sirius was the one who had been targeted, as he could feel that he had a lot of magic in him, something that Voldemort would not have missed either, which would explain the fresh scar on his forehead. Unfortunately, it seemed that Voldemort's curse, after rebounding on Sirius, had somehow damaged Harry's magical core, making the boy a Squib.

James and Lily, who were alive for the sole reason that Voldemort had wanted to torture them with the knowledge that he had killed their children and make them pay for defying him, had been crushed. Both were acutely aware that Squibs hardly, if ever, led happy lives, as they were looked down on by the entire magical society as failures, rejects. It was a well-known, if barely spoken of, fact that the most prominent Dark families killed all Squibs born in their families, to avoid living with the shame their presence brought. Lily especially had taken the fact hard, as James, being raised in a traditional Light family, would have seen little bad in sending his Squib son to an orphanage, since it was the common way to get rid of Squibs in Light families. Of course, he had known that his wife would never accept such an action, and as such had not suggested it.

Thankfully, Dumbledore had come up with a far better solution. Keeping Harry was out of question, of course, for several reasons. First of all, now that Sirius was known as the Boy-Who-Lived, numerous people would try to get at him, and Harry, being unable to use magic to protect himself, even unconsciously, would be a prime target for assassins seeking to harm his brother through him. Second, if Harry grew up with his family, he would grow to resent his brother, who not only could use magic, but also was a celebrity, and this was something that neither James nor Lily wanted. Finally, even if he was not targeted, and did not grow up to resent his brother, his job prospects in the Magical World were null. As such, the aged wizard had come up with a simple solution: since Lily didn't want to send her son to an orphanage, he would bring him to Lily's sister, Petunia. The woman hated magic, but since Harry was a Squib, he was unable to perform even the smallest magical feat, something that he had taken care to stress in the letter he would be dropping with Harry. Such would ensure that she did not mistreat her nephew, though he highly doubted that she would think of harming a blood relative. Of course, the Potters would arrange for some money to be sent monthly to cover any and all living expenses for their son, it was only right, since the Dursleys would be taking care of Harry.

By doing so, Lily would be able to keep an eye on her son's life, and even eventually reconnect with him when he was older and mature enough to understand the Potters' decision. He had no doubt that Harry would be angry, who wouldn't be when being told their parents had given them up? But he had faith that eventually he would understand that his parents' decision was for the best. In the Muggle world, he wouldn't be the Squib brother of the Boy-Who-Lived, he would be able to be himself and have a more fulfilling life.

Gently lowering the sleeping toddler with his basket on the Dursleys' doorstep, he took out the letter and left it in the basket. He had laced said letter with a few compulsion charms, nothing much, just enough that Petunia and her husband would be more accepting of their nephew. Better safe than sorry, after all.

"I hope you will live a good life, Harry, better than what our society could have given you, at least." he smiled, sadly. He had been trying to change the laws on Squibs at the Ministry, but unfortunately, Squibs were one of the few subjects that even the Light families didn't care enough about to truly try and change things. Progress had been made, as now it was illegal to kill the known Squibs of adult age, but that had been it, and they had very little job prospects, and even those few jobs they could find were paid so little that they might as well not be working at all.

With that, he Apparated away.

 **-Break-**

Petunia Dursley sneered upon reading the letter she had found with her nephew, securely tucked under a blanket in a basket on her family's doorstep. While she hated her sister for being everything she was not, and being a witch when she was not, she had not expected _perfect_ little Lily to abandon her own child because he wasn't a _freak_. This only comforted her in her opinion that her _sister_ (loathe that she was to admit it, Lily _was_ of her blood) had definitively become a _freak_ herself, much like that disgusting friend of hers, Severus Snape. Abandoning her own child!

Looking down at the black-haired child sleeping in his basket, she smiled. She didn't mind having another child, especially if they were being given money to raise him, and she would make sure that he would become a productive member of society, much like her parents had been, and her husband currently was. After all, if the _freaks_ didn't want to raise a normal child, then who was she to refuse to do what they couldn't. Not to mention, that a small part of her was positively _cackling_ at the opportunity to have some blackmail material on her _perfect_ sister.

"Well then, Harry, let's introduce you to your new family." she whispered, making sure not to wake the child.

 **-Break-**

Harry James Potter grew up in the Dursley household being loved by his new parents and his cousin, now brother. Vernon was fine with raising his nephew, since the boy wasn't a _freak_ like his parents, but a normal boy who had been abandoned by his _freakish_ family because he wasn't abnormal himself. After all, raising family was what normal people did, and his family was quite certainly normal, thank you very much. The fact that the amount of money they were being given to take care of him was nothing to scoff at wasn't bad either, of course.

Dudley had taken to Harry rather well himself, though unlike his dark haired cousin, he was much more lively and active, always crawling everywhere, and throwing tantrums when he didn't get what he wanted. Surprisingly, Harry's presence made Petunia realize that her son's bad temper wasn't actually normal for a one-year old, and she made sure to be more careful from then on, scolding Dudley when he was throwing a tantrum for no reason, and Harry as well, though in the green-eyed child's case, she didn't have to intervene all that much, as his _parents_ had apparently made sure that he did not act like a spoiled child.

At first, both Petunia and Vernon had been anxious, as they weren't convinced that Harry wasn't a _freak_ , since those things tended to be hereditary, but after almost one year of careful surveillance and no _freakish_ occurrences, they begun to relax. There had been several occasions where Harry would have used his _freakishness_ had he been abnormal, but not once had anything happened, so they welcomed him fully into the family.

 **-Break-**

 **October 31st, 1982**

For some reason, Harry couldn't sleep that night. He was usually a big sleeper, and had little trouble dozing off as children his age tended to do whenever they could, but for once, he just couldn't sleep. Still, he might have been able to _finally_ drift off to Dreamland if he wasn't suddenly startled by a bright light and a very loud cracking noise. Had he been older, he might have recognized it as lightning and thunder, unfortunately Harry was still very young and unable to grasp quite a few things. In fact, as a toddler, Harry used past experiences to know what to do, and the flash of light reminded him instantly of the traumatic event that happened to him a little under a year earlier. Few people can claim that someone had tried to kill them as a baby, but Harry Potter did, and the experience had left him with a lot of trauma. Of course, considering the abysmal intellectual development of the Wizardry World, no wizard or witch even knew what a psychologist was, as whenever someone showed signs of mental disorders, they were either left alone, or if the disorder became dangerous or too noticeable, they were carted off to St Mungos to have their mind "corrected". This meant that Harry Potter had _not_ , in any way, gotten over the experience of being nearly killed at the tender age of one.

As soon as the lightning stuck, his baby mind recalled a similar experience, where a Bad Person had used a bright light on him, and _hurt_ him so much. _Hurt hurt hurt..._ And of course, being a baby, he instantly started to wail at the top of his lungs because he didn't _want_ to be hurt. His wails woke up his cousin, who upon hearing cry started to cry as well. So afraid of suffering again was Harry, that what little magic he had left (a surprisingly high amount, for a Squib) tried to find a way to defend him against the imagined threat. As such, it focused on increasing his mental power to create a way for him to defend himself, not only then, but later. It made sure that Harry would be able to feel other people's emotions, in particular the negative ones that would indicate that someone held ill will towards him, and simultaneously made sure that he would be able to defend himself should the need arise.

When Petunia burst into the room, panicked, she was treated to a sight that made her blood almost freeze in her veins. The two cribs containing her son and nephew were _levitating_ , while every object under the weight of twenty pounds was being thrown around by an invisible force, as if an invisible, but incredibly violent storm was taking place in the babies' room.

"VERNON!" she shrieked, "COME QUICKLY!"

A few seconds later, a sweating Vernon Dursley quite literally barged inside the room, his mass seemingly squeezing through the door only to expand again once he was inside, though he too froze at the sight before him.

"Wha...but...he wasn't supposed to be a freak! Right, Petunia?!"

"No, he wasn't! Just...do something! What if something happened to Dudley because of that _Freak_?!"

Vernon blinked. What was he supposed to do? It wasn't like he knew about how the _freakishness_ worked, it was Petunia's sister who was abnormal, everyone in his family was normal! Usually he would have threatened the Freak causing the phenomenon, but even _he_ understood that threatening a baby able to use some kind of otherworldly power might backfire spectacularly. If the _freak_ was causing such havoc, it was likely because of something important, as he had never used his _freakishness_ before, not even when he was hungry or scared.

As another bolt of lightning stuck somewhere outside the house, Vernon's limited intellect made the connection with the ongoing storm as Harry's cries grew even _louder_ when the light illuminated the room briefly.

"He's afraid of the storm! Pet, try to sing that song! You know, the one you use to put them to sleep!"

Immediately, the horse-faced woman started to sing, and although her voice wasn't anywhere close to an artist's, her soothing tone helped Harry calm down, and soon the psychic storm stopped, the objects flying around stopped their dangerous dance, and the cribs fell back on the ground, the two babies inside them crying and sobbing quietly.

 **-Break-**

"What are we going to do, Vernon?" worriedly asked Petunia, wringing her hands together.

After the Incident, they had put Harry in a different room than Dudley's, as they didn't want to risk their baby child getting hurt because of their nephew's freakishness acting up again, which was bound to happen again, as Harry was still a toddler with little control over _any_ of his body's functions, let alone one they couldn't teach him how to control. They had entertained the idea of putting him in the cupboard under the stairs, but had decided against it as it was likely that it would only cause another episode like the one they had witnessed.

"What about sending a letter to your _sister_?" he asked, though it was clear that the idea didn't appeal to him at all. Had it not been because Dudley's safety was at stake, he wouldn't even have considered it. The less he saw _freaks_ , the better.

"It wouldn't work. I don't know how it works exactly, but I doubt that _perfect_ Lily would leave us her son and tell us he couldn't use m-magic if she wasn't one hundred percent certain that it was the case. They have ways to check for that, I'm sure of it."

"So what?" asked Vernon, "You are saying that his _freakishness_ isn't the same than your sister's?"

"Probably. I remember that Lily's _friend_ told her that their Ministry can detect any incident like the one we've seen. If it was the same, they would already be here."

"They have a _Ministry_?!" stuttered Petunia's husband, looking quite put out at the prospect of a government's branch entirely run by _freaks_.

"Vernon!" hissed Petunia, looking quite angry, "Now's not the time! We have to get rid of the freak, discreetly too, otherwise we might get in trouble with the other _freaks_."

"What about leaving him in an orphanage?" he asked, only to have his wife shake her head.

"It wouldn't work. It would be obvious that we've abandoned him, and they have ways of tracking people, I remember that _she_ told me they were commonly used on wandering children."

They pondered their course of action carefully. They had to get rid of the _freak_ , they didn't want any of his unnaturalness in their house, not only that but it would be putting their son in danger to let him around such a dangerous _thing_. But they also had to think long-term, if they weren't careful they might make the _freaks_ angry if they ever visited, and they didn't want that. The only thing more dangerous than a _freak_ unable to control his _freakishness_ was _several_ , _adult freaks knowing full well how to use their freakishness_. They didn't want to end up transformed into toads, or whatever they would do to them.

Then Vernon grinned.

"I have an idea..."

 **-Break-**

 **Year: 1983**

Harlan Wade frowned as he checked the list the matron of the orphanage gave him. He had heard about the odd incidents plaguing them ever since they had taken in a boy a year earlier, and he had decided to investigate. Many would have dismissed the occurrences shown in the list as inventions, or hallucinations, but considering what he knew, he was almost certain he had found _another_ psionic.

He had firsthand evidence that psychic powers were real, as his own daughter, Alma Wade, was an extremely powerful psionic, despite her young age. She had just been inducted by Armacham Corporation in Project Paragon, and had shown that she possessed all known psychic abilities. He was tremendously proud of his daughter, though he wished she would stop acting like a child and see what they would be able to accomplish should Armacham manage to control her powers. Still, having only a single subject slowed the project, and Harlan had decided that he might as well look for any other potential psionics, even if he had highly doubted he would ever find someone else as gifted as his daughter.

Yet the more he read about that boy, that Harry, the more he was convinced he might have found another psionic on his daughter's level. Of course, by that point, it didn't matter much if the boy was as gifted as Alma or not, if he possessed even _ten_ percent of his daughter's power, then he was more than what Harlan had hoped for. In fact, he had never _dared_ to hope that he would find another psionic in the time he had searched, as most were so weak their gifts were unnoticeable aside from a few mental symptoms.

"So, can you help him?" worriedly asked one of the caretakers, a young woman who had been designed as the one who had to take care of Harry. Her face was thin and haggard, most likely since the boy's power affected her, it was a phenomenon that he had experienced when Alma was younger.

Putting on his most charming smile, he nodded.

"Of course. I know a few people who can help him. Of course, I would need to be his guardian for that, I'm sure you understand that subjects like these tend to make people uneasy."

The woman seemed to almost sag with relief, he had no doubt that once the boy was gone, she would recover quickly. Still, considering how fast she was signing the papers making him the boy's guardian, it was clear that at the moment all that she wanted was to be as far away from Harry as she could, not that he minded, since it would suit his purposes.

 **-Break-**

 **Year: 1985**

Alma Wade was not a normal little girl, not by a long shot. When other little girls her age played with friends and laughed whenever they wanted, she had never had anyone she could call a friend, and it had been a long time since she had last laughed. Of course, at this point, one should take note that unlike other little girls, Alma was a psionic, something that seemed to have gotten her the attention of a few unsavory people. Her own _father_ sanctioned the experiments performed on her, experiments that most people would deem inhumane, and yet she had to live through them. She had lost count of the times where she had screamed herself raw, where she had _begged_ the scientists to stop cutting her, to stop shocking her, to stop _hurting_ her. Whenever they weren't satisfied with her powers, they would try to "help her develop her potential", and the methods involved were _not_ the kind that a child should ever witness, yet alone suffer through. Being repeatedly shocked while being strapped to a surgical table wasn't exactly a very good way to spend your childhood.

As such, it wasn't much of a surprise to know that the five-years old girl's psyche had become incredibly twisted, ruthless and hateful. It seemed that for all their eagerness to draw out her powers, the scientists had forgotten that their guinea pig was a child, one with incredibly dangerous powers, and that said powers were closely tied to her state of mind. Had she been treated with love and care, she could have become something of a superhuman protector, however, due to the violence visited upon her by everyone, with the approval of her own, only known _family_ , Harlan Wade, she hated everything and everyone.

She had tried to be nice, to have them stop experimenting on her by failing their tests, by making it seem as if she wasn't as powerful as they thought, by making herself less interesting in their eyes, but they had discovered that she had done so purposely, and had kept pushing her until the last part of her personality that still clung to her innocence had let go. They had destroyed her, made her a monster, all because they were greedy and evil people, so why should she keep enduring when she could pay them back? She had started with those that had hurt her the most, those who had ignored her desperate pleas for help, for _mercy_. She had sent them horrible nightmares, so vivid it was as if they were actually _real_ , made them see things that didn't exist when they were awake, slowly drove the most weak-willed mad.

Though recently, she had felt _another_ like her, but had been unable to contact him or her. She knew nothing about this person, not even their age, gender, or even what they looked like. The only thing she had been able to grasp was that whoever this person was, they were greatly suffering, like her. Of course, this would not have been enough for her to sympathetic, as she had long since learnt that _nobody_ would help her, but she had been very curious. Outside of being experimented on, she had little to do, and was always locked up in a room with a lot of security.

So she had tried to contact the new psionic. Due to the fact that something seemed to be blocking her powers, she was limited in what she could do, but she tried to speak to the person, only to fail. Whatever was blocking her powers was strong enough to make it hard for her to send telepathic messages to this person, as she was used to do whenever she wanted to speak. She rarely, if ever, used her voice to speak. So she had tried again, again, and _again_. After almost a month of tries and no successes, she had been ready to find another pastime, when one evening, she felt a foreign mind brush against hers. There was no message, no words, only a few emotions, but at the moment they had meant the world to Alma.

For these emotions had not been those she had always felt in the facility she had been kept in, negative emotions such as fear, anger, hatred, greed, or disregard for the life of others, no, for the first time in _years_ , Alma felt child-like curiosity, wonder, and excitement. It was not the sick, twisted excitement of the scientists whenever she passed one of their tests, no, it was pure _eagerness_ , happiness. At this moment, she felt her interest in this other psionic skyrocket, and eagerly sent back her own message made of emotions.

As nothing answered her at first, she felt afraid that this might only be a new, cruel test of the scientists to torture her, but her fears were alleviated when she felt the foreign mind again. This time, along with the emotions, she got a few images.

The first was the face of a boy that seemed to be around her age, with mid-long, pitch black hair, though where her own was straight, his seemed to be wild and have strands sticking out at odd angles. He was quite thin, like her, but maybe it was because it was how he was treated and fed. What fascinated her though, what completely captured her attention, were the twin gems that were his eyes. Alma had seen a lot of eyes in her time as a guinea pig, some blue, some brown, all different with subtle variations of colors. However, the boy's eyes were of an incredibly vivid green. They were much like her own, full of pain, hatred and sadness, and she felt bad for having doubted this boy.

The second image she got was a small room, much like her own, though where she had some books, courtesy of the man that she had to call father, he didn't have anything in his room but a bed, a small bathroom, and that was all. This was the first time that she realized that despite all her hatred for Harlan Wade, the man _did_ care for her, in his own, twisted way. He certainly didn't show it in a way she liked, but it was nonetheless true.

Finally, she got a name. _Harry Potter_. She guessed it was the name of the boy, who was probably the psionic she had sensed. She tried to "speak" his name, to feel it in her mind.

 _Harry..._

Not a bad name. She didn't know any Harry among the scientists, so she could tolerate that name as it did not bring up unwanted memories.

 **-Break-**

The first time they met was when they were both "asleep", though unlike most, it hardly prevented either psionic from being aware of what happened around them or from using their powers. Said powers had long since become strong enough to allow them to project their minds outside of their bodies and into other people's minds. The place they met in though, was not a mind in itself, more like a form of sub-dimension accessible only by people like them, a world attuned to them and their emotions.

Said world was very similar to the "real" world, with buildings, houses, trees, and everything that you would find in reality, save for one thing. Animal life. There were no animals there, only vicious monsters and abominations that would make grown men whimper in fear should they see them. Fortunately, being created by Alma's and Harry's power, they left the two children mostly alone, as whenever one tried to approach them they were destroyed viciously. The last thing that differentiated their world from reality was the fact that it was always basked in a dark crimson light, as if it was continuously burning.

Standing atop of a hill, they stared at each other for a moment, taking in details that their earlier conversations hadn't conveyed. Alma was wearing her usual red dress, a gift from her father that she was forced to wear as she did not want to wear hospital gowns. Her orange-red eyes stared dispassionately at the boy in front of her, studying him. He was wearing a white hospital gown that did little to hide how unnaturally thin he was, with a bracelet on his right wrist with the inscription _Project Origin-Subject 02_ on it. His raven hair was sticking out at odd places, giving him a slightly feral and wild look, reinforced by the glowing green eyes staring at her with an intensity that would have made a lesser person piss themselves.

 _Harry..._

 _Alma..._

Both children tentatively reached for the other, both wary of physical contact as they were used to the invasive probes of the scientists who studied them, or the rough treatment from the guards who led them from their rooms to the experiments' room. Both were so used to be hurt by others that the idea that another person not wanting to harm them was alien to their minds.

As their fingers gently brushed against each other's, they quickly withdrew their hands in fright, like scared animals, afraid of the reaction of another of their species. While neither of them feared humans anymore, they were both acutely aware that though the one in front of them was young, that they were a powerful psionic as well, and were afraid that they would hurt them.

 _Are you going to hurt me too?_ finally asked Alma, her mental voice almost a whisper.

 _Not if you don't hurt_ me _,_ answered Harry, who was looking very cautiously at the young girl.

Even now that they were both alone in a place where the scientists couldn't reach or monitor, both were still very wary of the other. Both had never had anyone they could rely on as far as they could remember, with Alma's own father allowing people to experiment on her, while Harry had been told that his family had abandoned him and had been used as a lab rat for the last two years. Both were aware that they could use their powers to see in the other's mind if they could be trusted, but both were also acutely aware that doing so would be the equivalent of declaring war to the other, and they did not want that. They much preferred an uneasy peace to a possible war between them.

 _Do you want to play?_ finally asked Alma.

 _Okay..._ cautiously nodded Harry.

For the first time in what had been a _very_ long time, Alma smiled. And although said smile was insane and full of evil glee, it was nonetheless a smile.

 **-Break-**

By the end of the next month, Alma and Harry were almost always communicating, what had prevented them for "talking" to each other before having either disappeared, or not bothering them anymore, allowing them to hold lengthy discussions using simply their minds. They had been very careful not to change their behaviors, as they didn't want the scientists to find a way to separate them, despite their respective pain at seeing what the other had to go through. Alma especially found it hard, as Harry was apparently used as a guinea pig to test the experiments that would later be performed on her. Apparently unlike her friend, she wasn't _disposable_ because she was a girl, though at least they seemed to be careful not to kill Harry whenever they experimented on him. Unfortunately that didn't make the experiments less cruel, as had he died at least he would have been free from the torture he was submitted to.

Nonetheless, their lives became slightly more bearable, as each one knew that the other was there, which was more than they could have said a few weeks ago. It was strange for both, the difference between feeling alone, compared to how they felt now that they knew there was at least one person that cared about them. Even at their worse, when they felt like crying, curled up in a fetal position in their beds, the other always was there to cheer them up ever so slightly.

They had become each other's most important person in the world, as neither could live without the other anymore, their hellish lives bringing them together better than anything else could have. Alma considered that Harry was _hers_ , as he was the only one who didn't hurt her, who played with her and comforted her whenever she was hurt, despite the fact that _he_ was much more often hurt than her due to the scientists using him as a guinea pig. When she had to go through _one_ experience made to augment her powers, Harry would already have gone through _three_. The fact that despite his obvious pain he tried to cheer her up constantly made him the only light in a sea of darkness, and she found that his presence helped her control her powers tremendously.

Much in the same way, Harry viewed Alma as someone very precious to him. While he had no memories of ever having a family, his fellow psionic had become the closest thing to a relative that he had, and he desperately wanted to protect her. He was very aware that being barely six years old he couldn't do much to help her, as his only edge against the people who hurt them, namely his psychic powers, was very closely monitored. Yet despite that, he did his best to help Alma whenever he could, meaning whenever he was not on a surgical table being cut open, shocked, burnt, or drugged so badly he couldn't tell left from right. Even when he was asleep, or at least his body was asleep, he did his best to alleviate Alma's pain. He told her bedtime stories he stole from some of the scientists' minds, using his powers to create the actors of each story and make them mimic the tales, at least in their little, pocket dimension.

They had talked a lot about themselves, even if there was actually little to say. Unlike other children, they couldn't speak about the food they liked, as they were always fed the same tasteless food, supposed to be "all that they needed", nor could they speak about their favorite teachers, as their education was done by reading the minds of the scientists around them. They couldn't talk about their favorite books, as Harry had _no_ books to read, and those that Alma had in her room weren't exactly child material, though she had still read them all at least once by boredom. So, unable to come up with their tastes or anything like that, they had settled on simpler things, like their names, personal history, what they could do with their powers, and especially, _what they would do to the people who hurt them when they broke free_. They had _a lot_ of ideas on how to hurt the scientists, but Alma always found new ones, especially when it came to her _father_. She _hated_ Harlan with every fiber of her being, and _loathed_ the fact that he was part of the reason she was even born in the first place. She had even admitted to Harry that she had once contemplated suicide, a few months before she had known him, but had been too scared to go through with it.

Harry himself had told Alma what he remembered of his life before being secluded in the base, how he had been in an orphanage for a year or so, how the other children avoided him and treated him like a diseased person. He told her how at first he had thought that he had been lucky to have someone adopt him, only to discover the true Harlan Wade as he was locked inside what had become his bedroom without so much as an explanation. He told her how he had come to hate his parents, whoever they were, for abandoning him. He had finished by admitting that he was glad that he and Alma were friends, as she was the only reason he hadn't become insane. She had given him a reason to fight to retain his sanity, someone to protect as best as he could, someone to cherish. She had seemed quite pleased by his words.

 **-Break-**

 **August 24th, 1987**

Alma was busy using the swing, her doll next to her. She was deep in thought, and considering everything that Harry had told her had made her see her life in a new light. While she certainly wasn't happy, or treated like a girl her age should be (she knew other children weren't treated like her after reading the scientists' minds), she had come to realize that her life was still slightly better than Harry's. She didn't suffer through as much experiments as him, she was sometimes allowed in the playground area to play while he wasn't, and Harlan _had_ given her a few things, like her doll, her red dress, and books. Harry had _none_ of those things, and was constantly either experimented on, drugged so badly that he could barely move, or sleeping.

She _liked_ Harry. He was the only one who truly cared about her, the only one able to _understand_ her. Sure, he was a boy, and she a girl, but their respective genders didn't really matter, as they only had each other. The world was against them, they knew, and they only had each other. She would never admit it to him, but Harry was probably the only reason she had yet to kill anyone, as while the both of them _hated_ the scientists, they had yet to physically harm them, though they certainly didn't lack the drive to do so. She _wanted_ to kill them, and she knew Harry did as well, but there was a very small part of her that was afraid of his reaction if she _did_ kill someone.

The sound of footsteps made her look up, and she felt her blood freeze in her veins at the sight of the heavily armed men walking towards her. Usually, when the scientists thought that she had spent enough time in the playground, they sent a few guards to fetch her, said guards looking nothing like the men approaching her. These men wore black clothing and helmets that completely covered their faces, making them seem like hulking behemoths instead of humans in her mind.

By the time she thought about running, they were already at her level, roughly grabbing her and dragging her away from the swing as her doll fell on the ground. She didn't even have time to use her powers to defend herself, as the sharp pain of a needle in her arm told her that she had been drugged, her vision already growing dim due to the potent drug injected to her.

In a last, desperate call, she sent a mental plea for help.

 _HARRY!_

Then she knew no more.

 **-Break-**

Harry had known that something was wrong the moment he woke up from another drug-induced sleep. The scientists seemed oddly excited, _relieved_ even, when usually they tended to be nervous around Alma and him, wary of their powers. He tried to shake the last cobwebs from his mind as he sat on his bed, groaning at the pounding headache he was feeling, but even said headache disappeared when he heard Alma's mental shriek.

 _HARRY!_

Along with his name, he could feel fear, no, not fear, the word wasn't strong enough, _terror_ was closer to what pierced his heart as he heard Alma's scream. She was not easily scared, even the worst experiments barely made her afraid nowadays, due to having already suffered worse before.

 _ALMA? ALMA?! ANSWER ME! ALMA!_

He barely noticed that the wall of his room had _exploded_ as he stalked out, his deep green eyes glowing with power as he ran as fast as his frail, _weak_ seven-years old body could carry him, following Alma's mental signature. Even unconscious as she currently was, her mind was like a beacon to him, brighter and more powerful than any he had ever felt in his short life.

Alarms blared as he ran, but he ignored them, focused as he was on rescuing Alma. He didn't want to lose her, he _refused_ to lose her! She was the only one to ever be nice to him, the only one to understand him, the only reason he was even remotely sane! Why hadn't anything happened to him first? Usually he was the one who got experimented on first, so at least he could warn her of anything that came her way. She was supposed to be too precious to be experimented on first!

"Here he is! Shoot!"

With a snarl, his power pulsed and sent the numerous shots flying before any could teach him, though he noticed that they weren't bullets, but rather ammunition made to drug dangerous animals. He didn't let the guards recover as he sent another pulse of power, ripping them to shreds as he kept on running, his mind still focused on Alma, his feet leaving crimson footprints on the ground. So what if he had just killed people? They had hurt Alma and him, and were trying to take her away from him! They _deserved_ to die!

Just as he was about to take a turn, he felt a sharp pain in his back, and he tried to turn around, only to fall, his legs already giving out due to the potent drug discharged in his body by the dart that had hit him. Looking up at who had shot him, he snarled as he watched the smug face of Harlan Wade watching him as he fell unconscious, cursing the man responsible for Alma's and his own hellish life.

 **-Break-**

Once he was sure the brat was unconscious, Harlan allowed himself to breathe. He had suspected that his daughter and Harry had been communicating, and now he had undisputable proof of it. Still, as he looked around, admiring the destruction wrought by Harry, he had to admit that he was impressed by the boy's power, which was probably on par with Alma's, despite his own doubts when he had adopted the boy years earlier. Then again, he hadn't exactly expected to find _another_ God in human flesh, he had fully expected his daughter to be the lone, most powerful psionic in the world.

However, Armacham couldn't afford to have either Alma or Harry harm their scientists anymore. Not only did it make their work much harder, but it was hard to find people to replace those that resigned, as not many held the necessary qualifications, and the lack of morals needed. Besides, testing the two children had been mostly done, and they had shown a great variety of psionic powers, much to his and his employers' joy. Now though, came the easy part. He had submitted his ideas for Project Origin to Armacham, and he had been given free reign so long as results were obtained.

Thus, and to solve the problem of the psionics' attacks on the scientists, he had commissioned what he had dubbed "the Vault", a special prison made to prevent the two children's power from breaking through. To prevent them from eventually combining their powers to break free, he had made sure to separate the two sections where they would be housed, using the same force field that would block their powers. Thus even if they managed to use their power in their induced coma, they wouldn't be able to reach out to each other and tear down the force field.

He was already beginning to plan how he would play things for the next step of Project Origin. Alma would need to be impregnated as soon as it would be safe for her to complete a pregnancy, though he was considering using Harry's semen to impregnate her instead of using engineered prototypes. Perhaps using the boy's DNA with his daughter's eggs would give him the result he sought out? Harry _was_ a very strong psionic, and his power had appeared more controlled that Alma's...So many possibilities!

 **-Break-**

 **WARNING: TIMESKIP!**

 **-Break-**

 **Year: 1995**

Lily Potter was swallowing nervously, continuously looking back at the entrance of Hogwarts' Great Hall. The anticipation was killing her, but hopefully by the end of the evening she would be fine. Still, she couldn't help but feel a feeling of dread settle in her stomach at the thought of seeing her son after fourteen years.

The first years of Harry's life at the Dursleys, James and her had been far too busy to check on Harry, what with the sudden end to the War and everything it entailed. They had to raise Sirius while fending off the hordes of well-meaning people, as well as the reporters who were trying to get a picture of the "Boy-Who-Lived", how she hated that nickname! Not only had they had to keep their privacy and allow Sirius to grow up without the constant hounding of his "fans", but they had also had to help the Order and the DMLE round up the remnants of Voldemort's forces. Lone vampires, werewolves packs, even Dementors, there had been A LOT of cleaning up to do, even with everyone's help.

Fortunately, by the time Sirius was two, James and her had seen another miracle worm her way in their lives. Ivy Dorea Potter was just two years younger than her older brother, and her childlike innocence had helped Lily tremendously when she was depressed.

Thankfully, a couple of years after Ivy's birth, the last of what remained of Voldemort's forces were either too scattered to properly tracked down, dead, or imprisoned. A few had managed to slither their way out of Azkaban thanks to bribes, but thankfully most of those who had attempted that strategy had been caught red-handed. Unfortunately, it meant that only the _truly_ dangerous Death Eaters had managed to walk away with their freedom, and that they held a massive grudge towards the Potter family. At least they were forced to be _very_ careful about what they did now, since with James Potter and Sirius Black supporting Amelia Bones in the DMLE, Fudge couldn't bail them out if they were found guilty of any serious crime.

Anyway, when the time came to see Harry again (James and her had decided that waiting until Sirius was eleven was for the best, since by then he should be mature enough to understand _why_ his parents had left him to the Dursleys), the Potters (i.e, Lily) had sent a letter to the Dursleys asking to meet them, making sure it was sent using Muggle post. Unfortunately, they had received a letter stating that Harry had disappeared several years ago, during a trip made to America. Apparently there had been an accident, and in the panic someone had probably grabbed Harry, thinking that they needed to take him to safety. The Dursleys had looked for him, but had failed to locate him. The letter had then pointed out that they hadn't asked the Potters for help as they had abandoned their son, and that they didn't want any of their _freakishness_ anyway near their family.

Lily barely remembered the following weeks. She had been frantic with worry, taking regular trips to America to try and locate him, but none of her spells seemed to work, even the Point Me spell had left her with a wand spinning erratically in her hand instead of pointing her the direction her son was in. It was only when _James_ - _loving, funny, caring and always joking James-_ had slapped her one day and given her a lecture on her duty as a mother that she had realized that she had been neglecting her other children. She had cried that day, she had howled like a Banshee, her sorrow too strong at having lost one of her children.

The following years had been better, mostly because friends had helped search for Harry, even if nothing was found, no matter the circumstances. Surprisingly, even when Dumbledore had asked Fawkes-phoenixes being able to find anyone they had ever met easily, and the bird had met Harry and Sirius when they were born-, the fiery bird had been unable to locate Harry. Had the records and the family tree not stated quite explicitly that Harry was still alive, she would have believed he had died then and there.

Still, they had not lost hope, and Remus spent a lot of time in America, looking for Harry. The fact that it had the added bonus of allowing the werewolf to have an _actual_ life in the magical world, since America's laws were _much_ more lenient with werewolves than Britain's was great in everyone's minds. Now whenever the man came to visit, he didn't look like Hell warmed over, but rather like a slightly tired man with prematurely grey hair. He had even gotten a job as an assistant teacher recently, allowing him to save some money of his own.

It was by the end of Sirius' fourth year that things had gone downhill. She had already been near apoplectic when she had learnt that someone had tricked the Goblet of Fire into selected Sirius as a Fourth Champion, but there had been little she could actually do for her son. Usually the contract used by the Goblet allowed for the Champions to withdraw from the Tournament if they felt they weren't worthy of the title, and so the Goblet would select another Champion from the same school. Unfortunately, since Sirius had been selected as the Champion of an imaginary school, he was the only student of said school registered in the Goblet, and as such had no choice _but_ to compete.

It had been a nerve-wracking year, spent between harassing Dumbledore to find _who_ had endangered their son, training said son to make sure he wouldn't die in the Tasks, and fending off the media, like that horrid Skeeter woman. There had been fond moments of course, like when Sirius had shyly asked Hermione Granger to be his partner at the Yule Ball, or when he had been kissed by the French Champion for saving her little sister from the Black Lake, but these moments were few and far between.

However, the climax of that year had been when Sirius had returned from the maze in the Third Task bloodied and haggard-looking, only whispering "It was Voldemort, he's back" before fainting from exhaustion and shock. She had cried again that night, holding her son's hand in the Infirmary as he slept, having been forced by Poppy to take a Dreamless Sleep potion to help him get some much-deserved sleep. She had known then that she wouldn't like what Sirius would have to say when he woke up. How right she had been.

She had held her son tightly as he had told his tale the next day, in front of Dumbledore and several other teachers, his voice shaky as he reminisced what had happened. She had _hated_ Voldemort that day, more than ever before. Not only had the man tried to kill her sons when they were _babies_ , but to use her son's blood in a Dark Ritual to regain his body? He was lucky that she wasn't there, Dark Lord or not, or she would have shown him just what she thought of him.

Unfortunately, Fudge being who he was, had point blank refused to believe them, even when Sirius offered to make a Magical Vow. Ever since then, the Prophet had been printing articles questioning Sirius' sanity, though thankfully after a few Howlers to the redaction, the allusions had become far less obvious. Still, she worried about what would happen to Sirius, since the Ministry seemed bent on not believing him. Despite James and Sirius Senior's efforts, Fudge wasn't backing down, since the Dark families were offering him their support.

Her worry had only increased when Sirius had shakily told the people present that Voldemort planned on finding Harry and using him in his plans, how he hadn't said, but all those present had known it couldn't be good. And unfortunately, the odds of him finding Harry before them were high, as many of his followers had rather large networks of information at their beck and call, especially in the more seedy parts of the world. That, and they didn't mind using Dark means of finding him.

Fortunately, Dumbledore had understood that if the Squib brother of the Boy-Who-Lived was to be killed, it would drastically lower the morale of the Light side, not only that, but there was a very real possibility that Voldemort would use him as a way to get to Sirius. So he had come forward with a suggestion. While searching for a way to find Harry, he had found an old book about a summoning ritual. It should, in theory, allow them to summon someone fitting the criteria inscribed in the ritual circle. With a few minor tweaks, it should allow them to summon the person who once bore the name of Harry James Potter, but the problem was that the cost of summoning was rather high in terms of magic power. So high, in fact, that even with everyone in the Order participating, it would be barely enough and leave them drained for a while, which they couldn't afford.

So Dumbledore had offered an alternative: since the ritual drained magic from those that participated in it, why not use it at Hogwarts, at the beginning of the new school year? Of course, the ritual circle wouldn't be in the Great Hall, as it would be rather hard to explain to the students _why_ someone appeared out of thin air, and they didn't want Voldemort catching wind of it. Lily and James were already suspicious of a few students, mainly the Malfoy boy, and wouldn't put it past them to try and abduct Harry for the Dark Lord if they thought it would benefit them. But the idea had merit. Instead of forty people participating, they would have around three hundred and fifty, _plus_ the ambient magic of Hogwarts. This should be more than enough magic to fuel the ritual, and leave all of them in fighting condition.

The ritual circle would be guarded by a few trusted Order members, namely Kingsley Shacklebolt, Nymphadora Black, Remus Lupin, and Arthur Weasley. Kingsley, Tonks and Lupin would be able to defend Harry should the need arise, or eventually stun him if he proved too uncooperative upon being summoned. Remus and Arthur were there mostly to try and explain the situation to Harry, both being rather apt when it came to calm other people down.

She wondered what Harry would look like. From what she remembered, he had James' raven nest as hair, while he had gotten his eyes from her. Since Sirius was his twin, she supposed that Harry would look somewhat like him, but Sirius usually kept his hair rather short, and she wondered if Harry wore his own, longer, as some Muggles did. Of course, she was also curious about what kind of life he had led, since the Dursleys had no idea of what happened to him, even now. Was he happy? Did he have a girlfriend? What did he like, what were his hobbies? So many questions she had for him!

 **-Break-**

"-and to those who join us for the first time tonight, I say welcome!" grinned Dumbledore.

The Great Hall was packed full, several hundred students, whose ages ranged from eleven to seventeen, sitting at four large tables and staring at the aged wizard. Candles were floating in the air, illuminating the room with a flickering light. The bewitched ceiling showed the clear night sky, with countless stars shining.

While Dumbledore continued his speech, Sirius Black was hiding in an alcove, using a spell to monitor how much magic was being drained by the ritual circle. For the moment, the magic requirements were about halfway met, since the ambient magic had charged the circle far more than what they had expected at first. The drain was continuing though, but now it was focused on the people present instead of the ambient magic, and he could tell that a few of the weaker students would most likely feel as if they had a bad hangover the next day, but there wasn't much he could do about it.

 _I just hope this works, Harry..._

 **-Break-**

In a deserted room in Hogwarts' dungeons, four people were staring at a glowing ritual circle. So far it seemed that there were no complications, but they knew better than to relax prematurely. Each of them could name _at least_ one time where magic hadn't behaved as it was expected to, producing results they weren't exactly ready for. As such, and until Harry James Potter was standing in front of them, safe and sound, they wouldn't relax.

 **-Break-**

"How is it going, Dora?" asked Sirius, watching in the two-way mirror as the face of his cousin contorted into a grimace, and her hair flashed red.

"I told you not to call me that, Siri!" she hissed, "Do you really want me to get you neutered? Anyway, seems like everything going okay. How much longer till there's enough magic?"

"'Bout five minutes I'd say. A few of the kids are already half-asleep. Poppy's going to _kill_ us when she learns about this." answered the Black Family Head, glancing at the assembled students.

In the mirror, the young woman's face paled as she gulped. It was widely known among Hogwarts' graduates that Poppy Pomfrey, the school nurse, took her job _very_ seriously, sometimes going so far as to boot out noisy visitors. There was a rumor that she had even, once, cursed Dumbledore himself until he agreed to step out of the infirmary, and most people who had seen her at work believed that said rumor was actually true. _No one_ wanted to be in the bad side of the woman who _might_ one day be the one who would heal them.

"Yeah, let's hope that Harry being here'll be enough to make her forget about this." she winced.

"Right." nodded Sirius. "Call me when everything's over. Moony should know when you can start the chanting."

 **-Break-**

In the room with the ritual circle, Remus Lupin continued to chant, his entire being focused solely on the ritual, on not making a mistake. He, like Sirius, treasured Harry, even if they hadn't met him in over a decade. Neither of them had faulted the Potters for their decision, as both had backgrounds that allowed them to see that giving Harry to the Dursleys was for the best. Sirius, from what Remus remembered, had had a Squib cousin who had been smothered at birth, and so understood better than most how badly Harry's life would have been if left with the Potters, even if his family loved him. He would have had to suffer the ridicule of being the Squib brother of the Boy-Who-Lived, his brother's fame acting like a beacon for the wrong sort of individuals.s

Remus himself could understand what Harry's life would have been, since as a werewolf, he was a second-class citizen, and it was only because of Sirius and James' backing that he had a somewhat decent life. Of course, he refused to have them use their influence to buy him a job, much preferring to shine due to his own merits, but their help certainly helped him in keeping a stable housing. He had no doubt that if he wasn't known as being James Potter and Sirius Black's friend, that his landlord would be far less understanding of the sometimes late payments he made.

Finally, after almost five minutes of non-stop chanting, the circle began to glow again, sign that the ritual was working. Although the sickly red color it had become did not bode well in Remus' mind.

 **-Break-**

Far from Hogwarts, on another continent and several hundreds of miles away, in an underground facility, people were running around, panicking at the last readings of their instruments. Only one man wasn't showing any signs of panic, standing behind the scientists monitoring the console showing the ever-changing readings of the status of the Vault.

"What is the status?" growled Harlan Wade.

He had spent the last seven years working on Project Origin, and so far nothing had shown any indication that either of the imprisoned psionics could affect the outside world when in a drug-induced coma. He had no doubts that one day one of them would try to escape if the opportunity presented itself, however he had made certain that said opportunity _never_ happened. Even when Alma had given birth to her child, she had been drugged to the gills to prevent her from trying anything. The baby was one this year, and had yet to exhibit any psychic abilities, not that Armacham cared much as the boy still had time before he was expected to show any special abilities.

Anyway, Harlan had made sure that the Vault was impossible to breach by conventional, and non-conventional means. The force field surrounding it prevented either Alma or Harry from breaching through the containment, and the building was heavily fortified, making it all but impossible for any conventional weaponry to damage it. It would take a nuclear warhead to breach it, and even then it would only do minimal damage. And he had taken special care to make sure than _no_ psychic power could break through it.

So what was happening?!

"Sir, the readings show that there is a large concentration of energy disrupting the force field!" explained one of the scientists, one whose name Harlan had never bothered to learn.

"Where does it come from?! Is it Alma, or Harry?!" barked the older man, not appreciated the panic he could hear in the younger man's voice. Panic served no purpose here.

"Neither, sir! It's coming from the outside!"

"Wha-"

"Sir, it's breached the force field!"

"DAMN IT!" roared Harlan, his fist hitting the console. "Fetch the security and open the Vault! We can't allow the specimens to break free!"

Seeing the horrified looks in the eyes of the people who surrounded him, he roared again:

"WHAT ARE YOU WAITING FOR?! MOVE!"

 **-Break-**

Inside the Vault, strapped to a cot, with an IV feeding him the nutrients he needed to stay alive, and tubes connected to various parts of his body to keep him alive and somewhat clean, Harry Potter cracked an eye open. He _knew_ that a lot of time had gone by since he was forcefully put where he was, but he had no idea how much. However, what he knew was that _something_ was yanking at him, trying to drag him away from the horrid prison he was currently stuck in, despite his best attempts at breaching it. He could also feel that whatever was trying to reach him held no ill intentions towards him, so he did not try to fight it. Though he could tell that even if he _had_ fought it, it would have been futile, as it seemed much more powerful than even himself.

However, as the energy began to envelop him, he felt a rush of panic, as he did not feel the energy reaching towards Alma at all. He _knew_ she was close, could _feel_ it, but he had never, in all the time he had been there, been able to communicate with her. It was perhaps the worst that Harlan had done to him, leaving him close enough to Alma to know she was there, but helpless to communicate with her. When the energy had come for him, he had assumed that it would help Alma too, but he did not feel it wrapping around her like it did with him, and so he fought it. What use was freedom if Alma was not with him? She was _everything_ to him.

Gathering his powers, he fought the energy, tried to reason it, to coax it into freeing Alma too. He had no idea if it would work, but as he felt a slight, very slight sentience behind the energy, something so simple he wasn't sure it could even be considered sentient. He reached out for said sentience nonetheless, sending mental messages to it stating that either it picked up Alma as well, or that he would fight it every step of the way, whatever it meant to do.

There was a slight pause in the energy, possibly as it weighed its' options. Harry knew that even if he fought it, he was no match for it, however he was more than powerful enough to seriously hinder it in whatever task it wished to perform, and he was hoping that it would be easier for the energy to get Alma as well instead of fighting with him.

Eventually, the energy seemed to accept that he would fight every step of the way if it didn't "take" Alma as well, and it broke through the barrier separating them. Immediately, he felt the voice he had hoped to hear during the time he had been imprisoned, the voice of the only person he truly cared for.

 _Harry?_ she asked, her voice very, _very_ soft, as if she couldn't believe that after all the time she had spent alone, confined, she could talk to him again.

 _Alma..._

Just as their minds touched, they disappeared, leaving behind a raging Harlan to see the empty Vault.

 **-Break-**

Back at Hogwarts, Remus and the other three guarding the ritual circle had to shield their eyes, due to how bright it was now glowing, though they took the reaction as a good sign since it was apparently what was supposed to happen when the ritual worked.

However, the glow suddenly dimmed, and when they looked inside the circle there was no Harry James Potter inside it.

"Remus, do you have an idea of what happened? Why didn't it work?!" asked Nymphadora, looking quite distraught.

"It's alright, Nym-" when he saw the murderous expression on the young woman's face, he amended: "Black, it worked."

"What do you mean, "it worked"?! I don't see Harry anywhere!" shrieked the metamorphmagus, her hair changing color from its' usual purple to a deep red.

"Well, it's just a theory, but this ritual wasn't exactly meant to be fueled by ambient magic, so I would guess that Harry did, in fact, appear at Hogwarts, but that the ambient magic somehow changed the place he should arrive at. However the question is: to where?"

 **-Break-**

Harry groaned as he came back to himself. One of the first things that registered in his mind was the sheer _weakness_ of his body. While he had never been very muscular, having been mostly underweight and skinny for what he could remember of his life, he couldn't even get up! Worse, not only was he unable to stand, his arms were even too weak to support the weight of his upper body! He felt like a helpless baby at the moment, a tall, skeletal baby from what he could see. He had never been fat, but now he could see his sickly pale skin clinging to his bones. He had no idea of what he looked like at the moment, only that it was unlikely that anyone would miss that he wasn't well.

 _Alma?_ _Alma, are you here? Alma? Alma?!_

A groan made him turn his head slightly to his left, where he could see another body laying on the ground.

 _Harry...?_

As Alma lifted her head as best as she could to look around, he had to refrain from snarling in anger at what the long captivity, and by extension, Harlan and the scientists, had done to the girl he had known. Her cheekbones were painfully apparent, her skin so stretched that it seemed it would snap any moment. It was also far from the pale, yet somewhat healthy tone it had held when he had last seen her. Now it was a sickly white, like bone. Her eyes were sunken in their orbits, the blazing crimson orbs staring at him in confusion as Alma slowly regained consciousness.

He watched as she lifted a bony hand, her wrists so painfully thin that it seemed a mere child could have broken them. He raised his own hand, using what little force he could use to move it, until their fingers touched. The cool contact made them sigh in contentment as they peered into each other's eyes. He was quite surprised to see unshed tears in Alma's crimson orbs, and felt some tears gather in his eyes as well. Finally, they were free.

 _Harry? Where are we...?_ she started, before her eyes grew wide and she started to cry while trying to get up, her too thin arms shaking under the strain, much to Harry's alarm.

 _Alma?!_

"My baby!" she nearly shrieked, her voice croaking from disuse, not that he noticed that. Alma had a _baby_? "Where is my baby? Where! Where did daddy take him?!"

 _Alma!_

He could feel her distress, her powers answering to her anger, warping the very fabric of reality around her, twisting it, _corrupting it_. He could see the stone walls around them turn black, as if charred, the air start taking a dark crimson hue, but most of all, he could sense the sheer _hatred_ permeating the air, rolling off the dark-haired girl in waves.

"I hate him...I hate himIhatehimIhatehim! He took away our baby, Harry!" shrieked the female psionic, as she shakily stood up, using her powers as a crutch of sorts to support her body. "Where did you take him, daddy?! Where?! I hate you!"

Harry felt red-hot hatred stir inside him. Alma was clearly distressed from whatever Harlan had done, and from her words, he had a rather good idea of _what_ the wretched man had done. Provided that his friend had spent the same time as him in a coma, that meant that she had been forcefully impregnated, _forced_ to carry a child without even her consent, and when came the time for her, as a mother, to take care of her child, it had been taken from her. Was there no end to the depravity of Harlan Wade?!

 _Alma...We'll get your baby back. I promise._

She turned to look at him with wide, crimson eyes full of tears, as the psychic tempest around them start to calm down.

 _You really think so, Harry?_ she asked, her mental voice a mere whisper.

He could literally _feel_ how distressed she was at knowing that she had a child but had no idea where said child was, only that it was most likely for the baby to be somewhere in the clutches of Harlan. He could not blame her for being afraid and angry, as both of them knew _very_ well how the man behaved. They both knew that _nothing_ would stop him from grooming the baby into his puppet, and this they did not want.

 _I promise. But for now, we have to see where we are._

 **-Break-**

Dumbledore had to refrain from scowling as he strode briskly towards the empty classroom the ritual had been held in. Following him were the Potters, Minerva McGonnagal, Severus Snape, Sirius Black, and several of the teachers, whom he intended to ask the expertise of, to determine what had gone wrong with the ritual, as it simply wouldn't do to have a confused, magic-less Harry Potter wandering Hogwarts' halls. While not dangerous, the school _was_ confusing, even for those who had spent most of their life working in the ancient castle.

"Wait!"

Pausing, he turned to look questioningly at Lily Potter, who had stopped, and was looking at her husband with something akin to exasperation.

"What is it, Lily? Can't it wait? We have to determine where Harry has ended before he hurts himself or meets anyone."

"Exactly! If we need to find where Harry is, I know how to do it!" exclaimed the redhead, before swatting James on the arm. "James, the map."

The Lord of House Potter just stared at his wife dumbly, before his eyes widened in sudden understanding and he fumbled with his robes, eventually taking out a piece of parchment. Dumbledore was about to ask him what he intended to do, but then he remembered the reason why the Marauders had almost never gotten any detentions despite the numerous time they broke curfew, and his eyes began to twinkle. Of course, leave it to Lily to remember the handy map that showed everyone's position in the castle at all times. And she was perfectly right, using the Marauders' Map to find where Harry was currently situated was a stroke of genius, as if would save them a lot of time.

He knew that the Map that James held was not the original, as James had gifted it to Sirius with his benediction, as the Boy-Who-Lived did deserve to be able to unwind a little, and the map would certainly help him in doing so. If he was correct, it was a new version that James held, one that Remus had helped create. It held all the features of the original, plus a very handy function that allowed the user to search for a person by name. It certainly helped keep an eye on the most rambunctious students, and these days, those that were suspected to be Death Eaters in training as well.

"Point me: Harry James Potter." whispered James, touching the map with his wand.

As they peered at the Map, they saw it zoom over a section of the castle near the Ravenclaw Tower. And indeed, in one of the unused classrooms in the area leading to the tower, was a dot labeled "Harry James Potter". What confused the people present, however, was the second dot right aside Harry's, reading "Alma Wade".

"...I do not recall a student with this name." frowned Dumbledore. Admittedly, he was rather old, _and_ had seen a lot of students in his days at Hogwarts, however he did not remember a student with the last name Wade at all.

"Minerva, my memory seems to be failing me. Do we have a student named Alma Wade in Hogwarts? Even as a first year?" he asked, only for his Deputy Headmistress to shake her head.

"I do not think so, and I do not recall seeing this Alma at the Sorting. But if this person isn't a student, where do they come from?" frowned the tight-lipped witch.

"For the moment, it is unimportant. It seems that the students are about to meet Harry and this Alma person. We should hurry." curtly said Dumbledore, already striding towards the place where he knew to find Harry.

 **-Break-**

Harry and Alma shakily stood up, using their powers to keep their bodies upright, manipulating their own limbs as if they were puppets. It was not a perfect way to move, however they simply couldn't afford to wait for someone to find them. Besides, they were quit wary of the people that they might meet, to break through their prison when even their own, quite vast power hadn't even breached the force field made them rightfully apprehensive of meeting those that could command such power.

 _Where are we?_ asked Alma, looking confused.

 _Old building?_ offered Harry, before frowning as he took in the ancient-looking walls, walls made of solid stone. _A very old building._

As he managed to finally get the hang on how to use his powers to support his body, he looked around. The room they were in was built entirely with stone, which, from what he remembered of seeing in the scientists' minds, meant that the building was very old. There was very little furniture, only a few wooden desks pushed against one of the walls. There were two windows, which were currently showing nothing but darkness, allowing Harry to see that wherever they were, it was currently night.

Seeing a wooden door, he motioned to Alma to follow him, and once she was behind him, he used his powers to turn doorknob, allowing the door to open with a loud creaking sound.

"What was that?" said a small voice, one that Harry and Alma could tell came from a child, or at the very least from someone who had only just entered their teenage years. The voice was distant, and only the silence surrounding the psionic pair had allowed them to hear it.

"It's nothing, probably one of the suits of armor stretching a bit, or one of the portraits." reassured another voice, this time belonging to someone noticeable older, probably about to become an adult.

Using his ability to feel others' emotions and stretching it, Harry found a group of teenagers walking in a corridor not far from where he and Alma were. Their emotions were a mess, quite a few were feeling awed and a little afraid, while others were almost brimming with curiosity, and yet others were filled with amusement at their peers' reactions.

He was trying to process what this meant when Alma moved past him, straight towards the source of the voices, making him stumble after her as he tried to catch up with her.

 _Alma,_ he hissed, _what are you doing?! We don't know who these people are yet! We don't even know what they want with us!_

 _Harry,_ she paused, looking over her shoulder, and making him cringe as her emotions ran wild, fear, worry, giddy anticipation all mixing together to form a chaos that gave him a headache simply by feeling it, _The longer we wait, the longer our baby stays with daddy!_

Suddenly, he didn't feel like being careful anymore.

 **-Break-**

Cho Chang smiled as she watched the first years looking around as if they didn't have enough time to take in the sights. She remembered when she was their age, the awe that she had felt at seeing Hogwarts for the first time, at walking through the castle's corridors after being Sorted. For many of those who had known about magic before receiving their letters, Hogwarts was legendary, it was the place where their parents had studied the art of magic, and an ancient castle built over a thousand years ago that still stood tall despite its' age. And for those who came from Muggle families, the moving portraits, stairwells, suits of armor, the ghosts, were probably things they had never seen before, their young eyes trying to take in everything at once.

She chuckled as one of the first years jumped after hearing a distant creak. They were simply so jumpy the first few weeks! Every noise made them nearly shriek, as if they expected a monster to shoot out from one of the corridors and take them away forever. Even some of the oldest students got scares sometimes, especially when Peeves, the resident Poltergeist, decided to prank them and caused suits of armor to fall on unsuspecting students suddenly, or tried to drop some of the chandeliers on them. She smiled as she heard one of the older students reassure the scared first year. Even if they weren't Hufflepuffs, that didn't mean they didn't stick together and didn't help their own.

However, the shriek of absolute _terror_ of one of the second years, a girl whose name she only vaguely remembered, distracted her, especially when other students started to scream in fear and pointed towards one of the corridors. Since it was only lit with torches, there were quite a few shadows in the area, and as she looked to where the scared students had pointed, she felt her stomach twist in fear.

At the very edge of the light given off by one of the torches stood two figures. However, what had scared the students was what the two looked like. Skin white as bone stretched over limbs far too thin to be healthy, at least by human standards, two humanoid creatures were staring at the group of Ravenclaws. They were quite tall, about five feet eleven for one, and six feet for the other, and from what Cho could see of them seemed to indicate that both figures were stark naked, though the embarrassment she should have felt was muffled by the _terror_ these two... _things_ seemed to inspire in her. She could see their eyes glowing in dark, fixated on the group students with the intensity of a laser as they slowly stepped forward, and she had to refrain from the urge to gag.

What she had thought to be two hags were in fact two human beings, who were vastly underweight, their skin clinging to their bones so hard she could count each of their ribs. Said skin was a clammy white, as if it had never known the sun, and seemed to glow eerily in the semi-darkness. In stark contrast to their white skin, the two people had long, pitch black hair that fell down to their knees, cacked with dirt. One of the two, from what she could see, was male, while the other, was female. The male's green eyes were fixed on them with an almost hungry quality to them, while the female's _red_ eyes were gleaming with an almost maniacal gleam.

 _Who are you?_

Cho stepped back as if she had been slapped. The voice she had heard had echoed _inside_ _her head_! All around her, the youngest students were stepping back, as the older students, mostly six and seventh years formed a wall between the two people and the younger Ravenclaws. The voice she had heard was definitively male, making her eyes inch towards the male figure standing in the corridor.

 _I asked you, who are you?...ANSWER ME!_

Cho couldn't speak as the air seemed to twist and turn and _warp_ around the two people, growing thick with malice, some of the nearby tapestries catching fire on their own as their inhabitants gave silent howls of fright and anger. The corridor around the visitors seemed to shift, as a dull crimson glow started to spread from behind the two people, while the shadows seemed to shift, as if coming alive. She wasn't even aware that she had collapsed, her legs having lost all their strength, until someone put a calming hand on her shoulder.

Looking up shakily, she found herself staring at the deep blue eyes of Albus Dumbledore. It was the last thing she saw before fainting.

 **-Break-**

Albus Dumbledore had seen many unsettling things during his long life, more so due to his involvement in the war against Grindelwald, and later, against Voldemort. Neither Dark Lord cared much about using the Darkest, foulest, most evil magic in existence, though at the very least Gellert had shown a modicum of restraint in the use of the Dark Arts. Voldemort hadn't shown such restraint, and during the War, he had witnessed his fair share of horrors. Children barely of walking age Kissed by Dementors, their souls torn from their bodies before they even had the chance to truly live. Entire towns overcome with Inferi, the inhabitants eaten alive in front of their families.

However, as he stood in front of the crowd of terrified students, the sight that greeted him chilled his very soul. When he had left Harry to the Dursleys, it was with the certitude that they would treat him as their own child, since he could not use magic. Even when he had disappeared, he had not been too worried, as he had spent enough time in the Muggle world to know that lost children were usually sent to the orphanage, so even if Harry had gone missing, he would probably live a better life than what awaited him in the magical world. It was as this moment that he realized that he had been wrong. So very _wrong_.

He didn't even know where to start to list what was wrong with the Harry Potter in front of him. His physical appearance showed that he was on the verge of dying of starvation, considering how badly his skin clung to his bones, and the unnatural paleness of said skin made it clear that it had barely, if ever, seen the sun. The fact that the teen was naked, yet showed little concern for his modesty, was also sending alarms to Dumbledore's brain. It spoke of a total lack of care born from having spent too much time naked around total strangers. And finally, there were the eyes. Sunken into his skull, Harry's eyes were nonetheless shining with barely restrained hatred and scorn.

As Headmaster of Hogwarts, he had taken to take a peek into some of the students' minds, if only to make sure that nothing unsavory happened under his watch. Though since he was old, and alone, some things still managed to slip by him, he was aware of that much. Using Legilimency on another witch or wizard without their consent was illegal, of course, but for the Greater Good he was willing to ignore the law every now and then. Besides, it wasn't as if he was reading through their entire minds, no, he much preferred to skim over the surface thoughts, it wasn't as if he was violating their privacy. However, and despite the fact that he knew that Harry Potter was a Squib, and as such, unable to even detect a Legilimency probe, he had a hunch that it would be a very, _very_ bad idea to try and read his mind.

His eyes drifted to the young woman in the same sorry state than Harry, standing at his side and glaring through her bangs of raven hair with her crimson eyes. The sight was almost enough to have him curse her on sight, as crimson eyes were the sign of prolonged use of very Dark rituals, however, if the way Harry twitched every time he moved was any indication, he doubted that such an action would endear him to the young Squib. There was little doubt in his mind that Harry and this Alma were close, as he trusted her enough to show her his back.

However, he decided to stop his musings for the moment, as there were other things to consider. From what he could see, both Harry and his friend were in dire need of medical attention, and very tense, as such, and despite his reluctance to do so, he sent a discreet stunner to the pair, making them crumple to the ground. That wouldn't endear him to them, but he couldn't let them move around when it seemed that their next move could be their last.

Knowing that Lily would most likely react very badly to the sight of her son naked and so vastly underweight, he called one of the House Elves, and gave said Elf express instructions to bring the pair to Madam Pomfrey immediately, and warn her to keep them asleep until their treatment was finished. They didn't need a pair of panicked teenagers waking up in the middle of the Hospital Wing, who knew what they would do?

Once the Elf had left, he softly sighed, and prepared himself to do some damage control. At least Lily and the teachers hadn't been there.

 **-Break-**

Standing over the sleeping forms of Harry and his friend, Dumbledore stroke his beard in thought. While magic was a powerful tool for a healer, there was simply no way for Poppy to have the pair back to full health before Lily Potter got fed up and took the infirmary by storm. As such, he would need to make sure that the pair was no threat to either the Potters or the students before then, as he would not allow any harm to come to anyone under his responsibility. Yet despite this, something inside him told him that attempting Legilimency on either of the currently sleeping teens would end badly, and would destroy any chance of Harry reconciling with his family before they could even meet again.

He couldn't explain this feeling, but in his long life he had learnt to trust his gut when it came to matters such as these, and as such, he would need to wake them up before too long and have a word with them. He truly hoped that Harry would understand his family's choice of leaving him at the Dursleys, but considering how badly his body had deteriorated, he did not expect a reasonable teen, more a very angry and hateful one. His body spoke of an extremely long period of abuse, possibly from the time he had disappeared from the Dursleys' to the present day, which would make it rather hard for him to convince him to be reasonable.

As he peered over Harry's form, the ruffling of fabric made him look towards the bed with the teenage girl. Despite having been stunned, which should have knocked her out for a good while longer, she was awake and staring at him, her crimson eyes boring into his skull with the intensity of a laser. Her face was contorted in something between a childish pout and a snarl as she fixed him, her eyes darting to Harry once or twice.

"Miss?" he asked, not liking the open hostility the young woman was showing him.

"Get away from Harry." her tone was not cold, it was downright arctic, and he could see something that he didn't like at all in her eyes: the willingness to harm him should he not comply. Worse, it was easy to see that said harm wouldn't be limited to bruises, but far worse instead. He was quickly reevaluating his opinion of this young woman.

Still, he had to try to reason her, unlike Tom Riddle, better known as Voldemort, she was not yet set in her ways, and as such, while he didn't believe he could completely prevent her from taking a Dark path, it was still possible to direct her towards a more peaceful one. He had confidence he could do so, as he had spent a very large part of his life subtly correcting most of Hogwarts' students, leading them towards more peaceful and law-abiding paths. He hadn't succeeded every time, he only needed to look at Lucius Malfoy after all, but he was quite proud to know that outside of Slytherin, most students were willing to follow his vision of a peaceful Wizardry World.

"Don't worry, you are safe here..."he started, pushing some magic in his voice to make himself more convincing, a very subtle trick that he had used often.

"I don't care. Get away from _my_ Harry. He's _mine_."

He frowned. The way she spoke made it very clear that she cared a great deal for her still-sleeping companion, although the use of such a possessive pronoun such as "my" made it seem as if she considered Harry as something like a possession, an object. The glint of madness in the girl's eyes didn't bode well for their conversation either.

Subtly grasping his wand in his pocket, he turned to look at the young woman. Since Poppy had yet to feed her anything more than the potions needed to stabilize her body and cure most of the more immediate problems with it, her face was still gaunt, although her hair looked a little better than before, since all the dirt in it had been removed with the use of a simple hair care charm.

"I apologize for my rudeness, Albus Dumbledore, Headmaster of Hogwarts, School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. And may I inquire about who you are, young lady?"

"Alma Wade. Why are we here?"

He was about to gently chide the young woman for being rude when her gaze suddenly shifted to something behind him, making him turn as well, to see Harry gingerly sitting up, though how he managed to do so when Poppy had expressed her concern over the sorry state of his muscles, he didn't know.

Smiling genially, he coughed, instantly getting Harry's attention.

"Hello, Harry, my name is Albus Dumbledore. Do not worry, you are safe here."

 _Why are we here?_

He blinked. Harry's lips hadn't even moved, yet he had clearly spoken. How could that be?

Shaking his head to chase the disturbing thought, he observed the teen for a moment. Harry was similar in many ways to his companion, and none of them good. Both were unnaturally thin, weary, both had a mad glint in their eyes, and both gave him the impression that they did not care about other people's wellbeing.

"Well, my boy..." he started, only to be interrupted by a scream of rage from Alma, who was already half-standing, and glaring at him, her eyes glowing with power.

"Not yours! _Mine_! He's mine! Mine!"

As he was about to try and defuse the situation, Poppy Pomfrey, the school nurse, burst out of her office, wand already glowing with a Stunning spell as she looked around to see what had disturbed the peace of her domain.

Seeing both of her patients perfectly awake despite the Dreamless Sleep potion, she faltered for a moment, before her training took over and she strode briskly towards the trio, her face stormy.

"Just what do you think you are doing, young lady?! You aren't in any state to be out of bed! Now shoo, get back under those blankets before I am forced to put you there myself!" she berated Alma, who seemed to be puzzled by the woman's behavior, while Dumbledore cringed.

He knew he was supposed to warn Poppy if her patients woke up, as she would want to make sure that they were in better shape than when they had arrived in her care, and able to take the potions which, coupled with a healthy diet in large quantities for the next week, would allow them to get some flesh on their bones. However he had wanted to ask the pair a few questions, but it seemed that his chance had gone for the moment.

"And you, Albus, know very well that you should have called me the moment my patients woke up! How am I expected to do my job if even the Headmaster doesn't show any regard for medical procedure?!"

He wisely decided to keep his mouth shut.

 **-Break-**

It was a little over an hour later, when they had finally managed to explain that they didn't mean any harm to either of the pair, that Lily Potter stormed the Infirmary, making Dumbledore cringe. He had known that the redhead would have little patience in a matter that involved her family, but he had at least expected that she would wait for a day before coming to see her son. He had hoped that by then he would have been able to gauge whether or not the odd pair was a threat to the safety of the students or not, since despite their lack of magic, they could still cause quite a large amount of damage if they felt threatened. He knew that in a situation like this, they could very well steal some knifes and use them as weapons if they felt they were threatened.

"Where is he?! Where is my son, Albus?"

Following her was James, although he didn't see either Sirius or Ivy with them. He guessed that the elder Potters wanted to meet Harry first, and ease him into the idea he had siblings. After all, being reunited with his parents would already quite a shock to him, no need to dump everything on him at once.

"Miss Potter!" admonished Poppy, from behind a curtain, where she was casting a diagnostic charm on Alma, now that she had finished on Harry, "This an infirmary, please keep your voice down or I will have to remove you until you no longer disturb my patients!"

He could see that Lily was conflicted, but even she realized that shouting wouldn't do anything to help her see her son sooner. Still, during the entire duration of the time the nurse cast diagnostic charms on Alma behind the curtain, the redhead showed signs of restlessness, pacing furiously and sometimes glaring at the curtain separating the pair from their visitors, although he doubted she realized how close Alma and Harry apparently were.

From what he himself had been able to gather from simple observation, the young woman was almost frighteningly possessive of Harry, going so far as to claim him as her own, as if he was property. He would have found the idea incredibly selfish had it not been clear that whatever the pair had lived through had made them incredibly dependent on the other. He had no doubt, after seeing how both reacted to even the slightest perceived threat to the other, that they would not care one second if they had to kill to protect the other. It was very noble in a way, however the problem came from their definition of a threat. They seemed to consider the slightest thing as an attack, and several times he had felt as if something incredibly evil had brushed against him, only to withdraw at the last second for some reason. What scared him was that whatever this evil power was, both Harry and Alma seemed to be using it consciously.

He was now faced with a problem he did not know how to solve. On one hand, he couldn't let the two teens continue using this power, whatever it was, on the other, he knew that they would most likely react violently to any tentative of preventing them from using it, be it mere words or a more forceful approach. He also couldn't separate the pair, first because even for the Greater Good, he felt it was too much to ask of the two teens, and two, because if he so much as _hinted_ his intentions of separating them, he would be faced with two people wielding a power he knew nothing of, and that he couldn't simply have imprisoned, due to one of them being the Boy-Who-Lived's twin.

Simply put, he was stuck. The Leader of the Light recognized the threat for what it was and wanted to take steps to ensure that they would never threaten the safety of another being, even if it meant being cruel to two teens who had clearly seen and endured more than a few horrors in their time. But the man in him wanted to believe there was something to be done for them, he wanted to believe that despite whatever had happened to them, they could become a force of good. But for the moment, neither could act, as Lily Potter was frighteningly protective of her family, and once she saw the state Harry was in, he was quite certain she would be watching him like a hawk, and no matter what he did, if she considered it was detrimental to her son, she would oppose him most fiercely.

So for now, he would observe.

 **-Break-**

Lily was pacing, her mind in turmoil. When she had agreed to have Harry summoned at Hogwarts, she had mainly thought about his safety, as Voldemort was quite certainly after him, both because of his relation to Sirius, but also because it was likely he wanted to use her son in some twisted, evil ritual to make himself more powerful, and then show off her son's corpse like some bloody trophy. However, what she had not expected was for Harry to be in need of medical assistance upon his arrival at Hogwarts. Even if he had disappeared, she had been confident that even if his life may not be as good as it could have been back at the Dursleys', he would be healthy.

But here she was, pacing in the infirmary, waiting for Poppy to allow her to meet her son and the girl who had arrived with him. Of course, when she had heard about the girl with him, she had feared they might have interrupted an intimate moment, but from what Dumbledore had told her, it was likely the last thing on their minds, and _that_ worried her. She remembered when she was a teenager, the hormones and how badly they had messed up her head. She also remembered being horny quite often at this period of her life, as her hormones messed up her mind and body. That didn't mean that she had jumped on the first male that she fancied, of course, she had used masturbation to calm her urges down, like most, if not all, teenagers. Sex was something that was never really far from teenagers' minds, be they boys or girls, so to imply that they were in such a state that the idea of being promiscuous didn't even occur to them was a testament to how bad a shape they were in.

She knew Dumbledore had wanted her to wait to see her son, claiming that he needed to be taken care of, to be more presentable so as to not cause her distress, but quite frankly it had done very little to make her want to wait. In fact, it had done quite the opposite. Even if she had abandoned Harry to her sister, it was out of concern for him, to help him have a better life. So she had stormed the Hospital Wing to see her son. She knew that even if they explained to him the reason why they had given him to the Dursleys he would be angry, it was his right to be, but she hoped that he would also understand James and her own intentions when they had done so.

Finally, after what seemed like hours but had in fact been mere instants after her arrival, the nurse got out from behind the curtain, and motioned for her to come.

As she made to rush to see her son, Madam Pomfrey's surprisingly strong hands grabbed her wrist.

"Lily, before you go in there...Don't be scared by what you see. Even if it looks bad, they'll get better, this I swear to you."

Gulping slightly as the nurse left for her office, motioning for Dumbledore to follow her, the redheaded witch gathered her wits, composing herself a kind, amiable face, far from the worry and terror gripping her stomach. What if Harry hated them? What if their son didn't want anything to do with them?

A large hand came to rest on her shoulder, as her husband grabbed her hand with his.

"It's going to be alright, Lily-flower, you'll see, everything is going to be alright..."

Smiling warmly as she felt her worries alleviate somewhat, she gave her marvelous other half a quick peck on the lips, before striding purposely inside the perimeter hidden by the curtains.

Her very first thought upon seeing her son was " _thin"_ , Harry was thin, _far too_ thin to be healthy in fact. His cheekbones were prominent, and his wrists were so thin they made his arms look like sticks. In fact, she was almost afraid of breaking one of his bones if she were to hug him.

As her eyes roamed his body, she noticed that his hair was worn long, so long in fact that it pooled behind him in a small puddle of inky black. But the most striking feature he had were his eyes. She remembered these twin gems, so similar to her own, when they were still filled with childlike innocence. Now those same eyes were filled with too many emotions for her to read, they were tired and weary, as if belonging to a person who had seen untold horrors. They were eyes that didn't, _shouldn't_ belong to a boy barely fifteen years old.

So engrossed that she was in seeing the son she had missed for fourteen years, that she missed the figure in the bed next to his, until she tried to step closer to Harry, upon which the girl-for it was a girl-hissed threateningly at her.

"Stay away from my Harry!"

She paused upon hearing the raspy voice, and looked to see a girl with long ebony hair and the same skeletal complexion in an infirmary bed, her hand half-lifted, as if to cast a spell without a wand. What unsettled Lily the most though, were the crimson eyes brimming with power and hatred, staring right at her. Despite being sunken and belonging to a girl who seemed as if the faintest wind would send her flying, they scared her far more than what she would like to admit. Those weren't the eyes of someone who was too weak to do anything, they were the eyes of someone who would fight until their last breath if they had to, using everything they had.

Then the girl's words were processed by her mind, and she felt a stab of jealousy and anger. _Her_ Harry? Who was it who carried him and Sirius for nine months, who had gone through hours of labor to give birth to the boy in the bed? Who was it who had quashed their own selfish desires to allow her son a better chance at life? And Harry was not a possession, a belonging, he belonged to none but himself!

"Listen here, little girl, Harry _is my son_ , and I going to make sure he's taken care of!" she snapped.

However, she did not expect her words to trigger such a severe reaction from the pair, as she suddenly felt as if something absolutely monstrous, that she couldn't even begin to understand, was now completely focused on her. For a moment, despite the knowledge that both were completely unable to use even the most basic spells, she felt as if she was facing with beings far more powerful than Voldemort ever was.

 _My_ mother _?_ _MY MOTHER?! I HAVE NO MOTHER!_

She reeled back in shock at the sheer _hatred_ coming from her son, trying to comprehend just how he could have spoken when she hadn't even seen his lips move. However, it was clear that what she had heard was her son's opinion, as he had grabbed the bed's sheets so hard his hands were shaking.

 _"_ His mother?! You _abandoned_ him! Even daddy didn't abandon me! And he's a bad, _bad_ man!" screamed Alma, her hand clenched into fists.

Lily was at a loss. While she had somewhat expected Harry to be angry, she had no expected this level of anger, no, _hatred_ , from her son. She desperately wanted to tell him that his abandonment had been for his own good, but even if her intentions were good, it was clear that her choice had backfired badly, and that Harry would never listen to any explanation coming from her, not in this state.

Luckily for her, the shouting had attracted Madam Pomfrey, who upon seeing the standoff, with one side being Harry and Alma in their beds, tense, glaring at the Potters and looking awfully angry, while said Potters seemed to be at a loss as to what they should do, she decided to kick them out.

"SHOO!" she yelled, waving her wand and sending the two adults none-too-gently stumbling through the doors of the infirmary as they closed immediately after and locked themselves. "You'll be allowed back when I'm sure you aren't going to cause any problems with my patients!"

 _Good riddance,_ mumbled Harry, as the nurse then forced him to drink something absolutely foulthat made him feel quite sleepy, though from what he had glimpsed from the woman's mind, it was harmless, mainly used to allow him to rest.

 **-Break-**

It was later that evening that the members of the Order of the Phoenix assembled in Dumbledore's office. Said members were Remus Lupin, Sirius Black, "Mad Eye" Moody, Nymphadora Tonks, Severus Snape, James and Lily Potter, Arthur and Molly Weasley, William "Bill" Weasley, Fleur Delacour, Minerva McGonnagall and Albus Dumbledore himself.

"So, how is Harry?" finally asked Arthur, a rather round man with red hair, who then winced as he saw the crestfallen expression on Lily's face.

"That is a good question, Arthur. From what I have been able to see, wherever Harry has been, he has not been treated kindly. Poppy has cast several diagnostic charms on both young Harry and his friend, and the results have been more than worrying."

"What do you mean, Albus?" asked Remus, a tired-looking man with premature grey hair. Unlike most in the room, he had a rather good idea of what was wrong, as while he had not met Harry himself, his enhanced senses had allowed him to catch the scent left behind by the pair, and it had made him very wary of the newcomers.

While the scent made it clear that Harry and his friend were in quite a bad shape, it was the feeling of pure evil rolling off the places they had been that had set alarms in his head. He had often smelled evil around Death Eaters and Voldemort, however what he had picked up from the two teens was even darker, and deeper, than the absolutely overpowering stench he got from the Dark Lord himself when he had gotten a whiff of it during the War a decade ago. His animal instincts warned him to not stay anywhere close to the two teens, screaming at him to flee as far from them as he could.

"From what I've read, it seems that starting from around when they were three years old, both Harry and his friend have been subjected to extreme torture on an almost daily basis. This lasted until they were around seven, after which the diagnostic shows that they have been in a coma until only a few hours ago. It also seems that whoever has treated them as such had Miss Wade forcefully impregnated and took the child from her."

By now most in the room where very pale, save for Snape, as he had _seen_ firsthand horrors that made it quite easy to stomach what he was told. Nonetheless, even the Dark Lord himself did not torture children, either he killed them, or he left them to the care of his followers. Said followers either killed them outright, or left them to die, but they didn't torture children under the age of seven or eight.

"Who did this?" growled Lily, her fists clenched and shaking with fury. It was no wonder, now, why Harry didn't want anything to do with her, from his point of view she was directly responsible for his suffering, and it wasn't likely that she would change his mind now. "Who...who hurt my son? I'll kill them!" she hissed.

"Lily!" barked Dumbledore, giving her a stern glare." Violence is never the answer. When we find who is responsible, they will be punished, you have my word. But for now, we must focus on the bigger picture. Now that Harry is safe at Hogwarts, we can start to plan our next move against Voldemort."

"Nothing good will come from keeping Harry here, Albus." interjected Remus, "He and his friend reek of evil, worse than anything I've ever smelt. I don't think keeping him in a school full of children is a good idea."

"Are you saying that my son is evil, Remus?" growled Lily as she turned to glare at the werewolf, who held his hands in the air in an appeasing gesture.

"Lily, I know you love Harry, but you have to face the facts: if he has been tortured when he was a child, it isn't impossible that it twisted his mind. Merlin knows what he had to live through, and torture can break even the best people." whispered the wizard, loud enough for everyone to hear.

"This is troubling. I, myself, have a bad feeling about our young visitors, yet I wasn't sure I could trust myself. However, they are unable to use Magic, I asked Poppy to check discreetly. So long as we are careful, I am confident that there should be no regrettable happenings."

"That fine, lads, but what about the other way 'round? We got a lot of Death Eater spawns in this school, what's to stop them from trying anything if they learn about the kids? CONSTANT VIGILANCE!" barked Moody, making the people present, minus Dumbledore, jump in their seats.

"Thank you, Alastor, but there is no reason to worry. A few wards around our guests' beds should be more than enough to make sure that nothing happens." placated the older wizard.

"That's all fine and good, Albus," started Arthur Weasley, "But how long do you expect a pair of teenagers to stay in their beds once they are healed? I have six sons and a daughter, and I can tell you that save for Percy, any of them would try to sneak out of the Infirmary the moment they are fine enough to move. So what will we do once they are back to full health?"

"An excellent question." came the silky voice of Snape, who has leaning on the wall in the shadows. "Given all the Potters' talent for causing trouble, what makes you think that the Squib will be any different?"

His words earned him a glare from his schooldays arch-nemesis, and an exasperated roll of Lily's eyes.

"I could always have them at Grimmauld, if that helps. There aren't any Dark artifacts left there, I checked a long time ago, and the new House Elves are always pestering me about having more people come and eat." offered Sirius.

"That would be a good idea." nodded Dumbledore, turning to look at the Potters. "Would Sirius' offer be alright?"

"Sure." nodded James, "We eat there almost once a week, so we should be able to check on them regularly."

"It is decided then. Now, about our next action..."

 **-Break-**

Harry smiled as he rested next to Alma. They had taken to sleep next to each other, even if said action seemed to displease Madam Pomfrey. After spending their entire life separated, only being able to speak through the use of their powers and to meet in another dimension, they weren't about to allow anyone to separate them again. Besides, they couldn't understand _why_ the nurse considered their action shameless and immoral. All they did was hold each other when they slept and it wasn't as if they had any nudity taboos either.

It had already been two weeks since they had arrived, and while Alma had wanted to leave immediately to reclaim their son, he had managed to convince her to wait until they were in better shape. It had been a harsh discussion, Alma had even accused him of not caring about their baby, yes _theirs_ , as apparently Harlan had used Harry's semen to impregnate her, but since they were psionics, all she had needed was to read his mind to know that he _did_ care. However, while he did care, he was more detached emotionally as he hadn't know about the child until a few days earlier, nor had he been the one to carry the baby. Such things created strong bonds between a mother and a child, which as the father, he didn't have. He had also pointed out that if they tried to hunt Harlan in their current state, it was only a matter of time before they were captured again, and locked away for good. So in the end, she had reluctantly agreed to wait until they were back at full health, knowing that it shouldn't take long, as their condition improved by the day thanks to the healthy food and potions they were given.

Of course, they made sure to check in the nurse's mind that nothing in their food was drugged, or that the potions had undesirable effects, since from what they had learnt, love potions and the like existed. Neither of them wanted to have their mind tampered with, as it was the lone sanctuary they had had since their childhood, even Harlan being unable to take it from them. It actually terrified them to no end to know that if they weren't careful, they might end up drinking something that would alter their minds.

They were now far healthier than they had ever been, as apparently one of the potions they were fed greatly increased how much nourishment their bodies got from the food they ate. This, coupled with a healthy diet strictly overlooked by the unrelenting nurse had allowed them to gain over sixty pounds in the two weeks they had been there. Coupled with several physical exercises she had them perform, their muscles had grown enough that they now looked almost healthy.

Harry, now that he no longer looked like a walking skeleton, looked like a younger, and more effeminate, James Potter, with his mother's deep green eyes. His hair, that he had refused to have cut, was an inky black that seemed to absorb ambient light, and feel down to his knees. This gave him a very effeminate look, and coupled with the fact that he barely "spoke", it was easy to mistake him for a rather flat and shy girl.

Alma, for her part, had begun to fill out, although she was still thinner than Harry. Her breasts had begun to grow now that she wasn't underfed, and were already rather big for someone who had been lacking food most of her life. This prompted a few humorous moments between the dark-haired teen and the nurse, as the latter had tried to introduce bras to Alma, only for the teen to flat out refuse to wear any, as she found them constrictive and unpleasant to wear. This had prompted a long explanation from Madam Pomfrey about how improper it was to not wear bras and hide her skin, etc...Neither had budged from their position, which made their regular check-ups rather tense. Harry or Alma _could_ have threatened her to ensure she left them do as they pleased, but they weren't willing to risk the nurse reporting them to Dumbledore, as they knew the old man had no clue about their powers, and they intended for it to stay that way until they were fit to leave.

It was rather boring to stay cooped in the infirmary, so whenever they could, Harry and Alma read the minds of the people in the castle, soaking in as much information as they could. They had learnt that as a whole, wizards and witches were less powerful than them, but made up for it by being more inventive and having areas of expertise they didn't. The simplest ward was beyond their reach, although Harry believed, after extensively reading the minds of some of the teachers, that while normal wards were something they would never be able to use, Blood Wards, and everything related to Blood Magic would be available to them. However nobody held much knowledge on the subject, and as such he couldn't really test his theory as Blood Magic was illegal, and asking for information on it would put them in trouble.

Still, they learnt as much as they could, focusing on the rather glaring weaknesses of the magic users if they ever needed to fight them. They knew that physically they were weak, and that even they, recovering from a long period of malnourishment, held a fair chance of beating a Pureblood in a physical confrontation. Other than that, all they needed to do to incapacitate a magic user was to break or take their wands from them, ninety-nine percent of them being useless at magic without it, while they could use their powers without the need for a focus.

They had quickly discovered that Voldemort, despite what Dumbledore repeatedly claimed, could easily attack inside the castle as around two dozen students were marked Death Eaters, who would be very glad to deliver them to the Dark Lord if they ever discovered their presence in the castle. And while Dumbledore preached forgiveness and second chances, _they_ most certainly didn't, which meant that their lives were forfeit the moment they tried anything towards them.

Feeling Alma snuggle deeper in his side, he gently started to trail his fingers into her hair. At first, when he had tried to do so the first time, she had stiffened in confusion, as she had no idea of what was happening, since she had never experienced any display of affection. It was only because he had learnt that such an action usually felt good from the head of a random female student that he had tried to see if Alma would like it. It had taken time, but now at the very least, she seemed to no longer fight it. And if the feeling of satisfaction he was getting from her was genuine, then she did enjoy the action.

 _Soon, Alma...Soon, we'll leave this place and find our son...I promise you._

 **-Break-**

Eventually, Harry and Alma were fully healed, much to their relief, as they could hardly stand to sit by idly in the infirmary. After spending their childhood as prisoners and guinea pigs for Harlan Wade's experiments, now that they had the opportunity to _finally_ be free, they had trouble sitting still, even despite their pitiful state when they had arrived. What did they care that they were cooped "for their safety"? Dumbledore may try to confuse them and convince them he only had their best interests at heart, they could easily tell that he was not honest with them, and that despite his cheerful attitude he was wary of them.

They had loathed how the man told them they would go and live with Sirius Black, with no regards for their own wishes or wants. They had never met this "Sirius", even if they knew much about him thanks to the time they had spent looking through the minds of the Potters, and the old man simply didn't understand that they trusted others very, _very_ rarely. In fact, Poppy Pomfrey was the only person they held _any_ amount of trust for, and even then, it was strenuous at best. Neither teen could trust anyone outside of the other, as they had spent their entire lives used by others. It was no wonder then that they didn't trust easily.

They hadn't even needed to talk to know that they both _refused_ to listen to the old man, and had agreed that they would leave once everyone was in the Great Hall, this way they should avoid Madam Pomfrey making a fuss and trying to prevent them from leaving. While her overbearing ways irritated them slightly, they were still grateful for her care and for nursing them back to health, as such they had no wish to kill her, and wanted to avoid situations where they wouldn't have a choice but to do so.

They waited for a Friday evening, knowing that they were when most students stayed for a while in the Great Hall since they had the week-end to finish any homework they might have. Madam Pomfrey also usually stayed longer to discuss things with other members of the staff, at least when she didn't have patients that needed her care, a category that neither of the teens belonged to.

The door was a pitiful obstacle. Even reinforced with magic as it was, or so they had been told, it had its' weak points, and a mildly powerful blast of psionic power was all that was needed to send it crash into the wall on the opposite side of the corridor. Looking around, they hurried, using the memories of the countless students whose minds they had read to orient themselves as they had never stepped outside of the infirmary. They were not stupid, and knew very well that Dumbledore would have left some wards to warn him should they try to escape, which meant they had precious little time to flee before the man tracked them down. For all his grandfatherly speeches, he certainly seemed to like controlling other people.

They held no illusions that at some point, they would have to fight, even if they hoped they didn't have to. They had chosen a moment when nobody should be in the corridors for that very reason, after all. While they didn't mind killing those that got in their way, that didn't mean they would go out of their way to slaughter innocent people. Of course, if said people tried to prevent them from leaving, they would die, but if they didn't realize they were leaving, they would be able to limit the number of people they had to fight and kill.

They had little trouble navigating the castle, even if it _was_ technically the first time they strode down the massive corridors, as countless hours of reading students' minds to form a mental map had made it easy for them to orient themselves. Similarly, they were not shocked to see moving portraits and paintings, as otherwise they might have paused in their tracks to stare at the strange contraptions. As it was, they barely spared a glance to the numerous paintings, even if said paintings would obviously warn Dumbledore and his staff that they were leaving.

 **-Break-**

Albus Dumbledore was not happy. While he had expected his young guests to try something, he had still hoped that they wouldn't be foolish enough to think they could leave without him learning of it. What bothered him though, was that the tracking spells he had put on them clearly showed they were on the first floor and moving fast, when Hogwarts should have confused them with its' moving staircases, passageways and moving paintings. There was also the fact that they had somehow managed to get out of the infirmary, despite the door being charmed to not allow them to leave.

While he was confident that he could subdue the pair easily, as they were after all _Muggles_ , while he was the only man Voldemort himself had ever feared, he had taken a few members of the staff and the Order with him. Lily and James were there of course, as he hoped that they would be able to reason their son, a risky gamble that may backfire but that he felt he should try, Poppy, whom he hoped the two teens didn't want to fight, as she had been the one to heal them, Sirius, who had insisted to come, and Remus, whose negotiations skills would be invaluable it they wanted to settle the matter peacefully. He _could_ stun the pair and move them back to the infirmary, but he feared that by doing so he would be painting himself as the enemy, something he didn't want. He hoped that despite their clear wish for freedom, Harry and Alma could be reasoned, but if they couldn't, then he would have to make sure they couldn't endanger themselves. It was for the Greater Good, after all.

"Here they are!" shouted Sirius, pointing at a staircase, where Harry and Alma could be seen running down.

Whipping out his wand, Albus quickly cast a spell made to create a wall of cushioned energy, something often used by parents to confine unruly children in their bedrooms. The wall worked as a physical obstacle, but no matter how hard one was to try and hit it, it would simply distend to absorb the damage, before gently going back to its' original shape. This meant that the children could run headfirst into it and wouldn't suffer the slightest damage, instead they would feel as if they had just run into a very soft pillow.

The group watched as the pair stilled almost immediately, refusing to even _touch_ the shimmering wall as if fearing it would harm them. Albus could see Lily's sadness at the fact that her son thought they would harm them, but alas, there was little he could do about it for the moment. The Potters hadn't been able to see Harry again after his violent reaction the first time he had been told they were his parents, and he himself had been very busy, unable to meet with the pair as much as he wanted. Even then, he had found himself avoiding the meetings, as _something_ about the teens made him very uncomfortable.

Slowing to a stop, the group stared at the two teens behind the wall of shimmering energy, Harry and Alma glaring back at the wizards with pure hatred on their faces.

 _Let us go. We're fine now, we don't need to stay in the infirmary anymore._

"No, Harry. It is for your own safety that you have to stay there, at least until you are moved to Grimmauld." explained Dumbledore, hoping that the two teens would be reasonable. He felt no joy in depriving the pair of their freedom, but losing Harry to Voldemort would be disastrous, not only for the morale of the Light, but also because as Sirius' twin, the Dark Lord would undoubtedly try to use the bond between them to try and harm the Boy-Who-Lived.

"Let us go!" shrieked Alma, her eyes blazing with anger, hatred and to their surprise, some desperation. "We can't stay here! We have to save our baby! Daddy's going to hurt him!"

At that the adults winced. None of them had forgotten the two teens' circumstances, and they couldn't deny that preventing them from seeking out their child from the person who had taken him was more than cruel, but they simply couldn't afford to let them go, not when Voldemort could sweep in and take them if they were left to their own devices.

"Perhaps I could have some acquaintances look for your child..."offered Dumbledore. If he could secure the two teens' safety while helping them, why not? It would indebt them to him in a manner of speaking, allowing him to keep an eye on them should they ever become dangerous, at least as dangerous as people who couldn't use magic could be.

"No! No no no no!" shrieked Alma, looking panicked. "You can't! He's our son! Ours! You can't have him!"

Dumbledore frowned, and opened his mouth to try and reason with the clearly distraught girl, but Poppy beat him to the punch as she huffed and crossed her arms over her torso.

"Young lady, you are too young to take care of a child, let alone a baby. Even if it _is_ your child, I think it would be best to have him given to people who already have experience taking care of children, like the Potters. It would be better for the baby, and you would be able to see your child anytime you would want to."

Albus had to admit that it was a good idea, as the idea of leaving a baby to the two teens worried him, since both had shown clear signs of being mentally unstable, and he highly doubted that they would be able to properly care for a baby when they themselves lacked the knowledge of what a normal life was. That, and maybe that leaving the child with the Potters would have Harry visiting them more, he hadn't forgotten his plans to have the Squib Potter reconcile with the other members of his family.

He was brought out of his musings by a distressed moan as Alma bent over, her hands grasping her head and ruffling her hair as she muttered to himself.

"No no no no...They want to take him...they want to take my baby from me...I hate them...Hatethemhatethemhatethem..."

As she muttered to herself, Harry was shaking with rage, and the assembled adults took a step back as a crimson glow started to permeate the air behind the pair of teens. The air seemed to be growing hotter by the minute, and several paintings caught fire spontaneously, their occupants shrieking in protest as they hastily moved from their frames.

 _It's_ OUR _baby! Ours! I won't let you take him from us!_ roared Harry, his face set in a hateful snarl.

Poppy took out her wand at that, her face set in a scowl.

"This is why you can't be the one raising the child, you aren't fit to be a parent yet! Do you want your child to be cared for, yes or no?"

"My baby..." whispered Alma, looking up, her crimson eyes blazing with so many emotions that those present couldn't hope to understand what was going through her mind. "I'll take him back from daddy... He'll live with us..."

Now the crimson glow was growing more and more, as the wizards and witches present stepped back, astonished at the sight of what was happening. Lily turned to look at Dumbledore, her face confused:

"Albus? I thought Harry was a Squib, how can he do this? Is this Alma's doing? I thought you said she can't use magic?"

"I am as surprised as you are, Lily." admitted the old man, frowning, his wand already moving and casting obscure detections charms. The results that came back puzzled him greatly, as they showed that no actual magic was used, but it made no sense! "Apparently this isn't magic."

"If this isn't magic, I'm Merlin." deadpanned Sirius, his wand out and ready to cast at a moment's notice.

"I think it's the truth." calmly said Remus, who was staring at the pair with revulsion clear on his face.

"What do you mean, Moony?" asked the Black Head, as he kept his eyes trained on the pair, Alma again muttering to herself and Harry glaring at them, twitching badly, as if he was only just refraining from attacking them.

"I can smell magic, and this isn't it. I think it's some form of psychic power."

Seeing the others, save for Lily, look at him strangely, he elaborated:

"Muggles have stories of people whose minds are so strong it allows them to manipulate reality, moving objects without touching them, using nothing but their minds. An alternative to magic, if you want." said the werewolf, who was scowling at the pair. "But this power they're using reeks of evil and madness."

Whatever reactions the adults present could have had at the news, it was drowned when Alma let out a bloodcurdling shriek, and the magic wall which had kept the pair on the staircase was _shattered_ , broken in a thousand pieces by a force that sent the group flying several feet in the air. Thankfully for them, they landed without breaking any bones, and they hastily stood back up, sending stunners at the pair.

With a snarl, Harry thrust his arm forward, destroying the beams of light with ridiculous ease and leaving most of the magic users present gaping, as none had ever heard of someone able to _destroy_ spells. Shield against them, nullify their effects, _that_ was possible, they knew, but to _destroy_ spells? Unthinkable!

 _We're leaving_ , said Harry, his emerald eyes glaring at the people present, while one of his hands was on Alma's shoulders. _Don't try to find us again, we'll kill you_.

However, before they took take a step, Dumbledore intervened. This time his face was hard, devoid of the usual warmth most associated with the old wizard. Many would have cowed in the face of such an angry expression on the face of THE Albus Dumbledore, most powerful wizard alive, the man who had defeated Grindelwald, but neither of the teens seemed to be scared, Harry merely seemed to get angrier, while Alma clutched her companion's arm like a lifeline as her expression became increasingly desperate and furious.

"This will be quite enough, Harry. You will cease acting like a child and listen to your elders now, am I clear? We cannot let you leave, not with Voldemort looking for you and seeking to use you to harm Sirius. Now you will stand down, or I will be forced to stun you and confine you to the infirmary."

For a moment, the adults present thought that Harry would actually listen to the old man. After all, he _was_ Albus Dumbledore, the most powerful wizard alive, Leader of the Light, and a great man. What they failed to realize was that unlike them, neither Harry nor Alma had grown up being told that the man was flawless, the second coming of Merlin, they hadn't been indoctrinated to listen to him since they were eleven. They didn't realize that to the two teens, adults were almost _always_ enemies, people who wanted to hurt them, to use them for their own ends, people who had taken away any and all happiness they could have felt in their life. They failed to understand that by denying the pair the possibility to rescue their child from Harlan Wade, they had destroyed any and all chances they had to appear as anything but enemies to the two teens.

The angry snarl from Harry was the only warning Dumbledore had before he was sent flying with _much_ greater force than before, and only Fawkes appearing and flaming his partner out allowed the old man to avoid finishing as a smear on a wall. By the time he had reappeared, Harry and Alma were already running towards the entrance, only for several suits of armor to block their path. Said armors were promptly sent flying, not even slowing the pair down. Unfortunately for them, even if they were healed, they were nowhere near used to strenuous physical activities, meaning that their speed was too low for them to reach the doors before they slammed shut and sealed themselves, ancient magic activating and reinforcing them to make them harder to break.

While he was confident the door would resist whatever the pair could try to open it, Dumbledore quickly approached them, hoping to stun them while they were busy trying to escape, Madam Pomfrey hot on his heels, while the Potters and remaining Marauders seemed to be hesitating on what they should do. Sure, they knew Harry was in danger if he left, but did they really have a right to decide his life for him? It hadn't worked so well the first time around, and it was unlikely to work much better then. Besides, the teens' reason for leaving was valid, and somewhat inspiring: despite clearly not having planned to have a child from what Poppy had found, they still cared for their son enough so that they were willing to fight those who would stand in their way to save him. Did they really have a right to intervene?

However, while they hesitated, several people, most of them teachers but a few being prefects as well, stepped in the corridor from inside the Great Hall, having heard the commotion and the door slam closed. Evidently, upon seeing the school nurse and the headmaster with their wands out and staring at a pair of teens that none of them (save for McGonnagal and Snape) had seen, they quickly took position behind the two magic users, their wands at the ready.

"Headmaster, who are these two people?" asked Aurora Sinistra, one of the youngest teachers, and as such, one who had the least reasons to follow the aged wizard without question.

While she could easily admit that Dumbledore _was_ a great wizard, she did not exactly feel comfortable threatening two teens, who, despite their hateful expressions, seemed like they'd rather be elsewhere instead of trapped inside Hogwarts.

"Everyone, it is vital that we capture these two. Their safety is paramount in the defeat of Lord Voldemort, yet they are acting like children and trying to leave the safety of Hogwarts' walls. I understand if you feel uneasy at the thought of harming them, but we must merely stun them and bring them back to the infirmary."

 _I'll_ kill _you if you try, Dumbledore..._ hissed Harry, looking murderous.

"I apologize, Harry, but sometimes sacrifices must be made for the Greater Good..." sadly said the old man, before waving his wand, sending stunners towards the pair...Only to have them destroyed before reaching ten feet of their targets. However, before either of the teens could react, ropes appeared and bound them, while their bodies seemed to lock down, refusing to answer their orders, as they fell backwards. Knowing well that whatever spell he sent to neutralize the teens would be destroyed, Dumbledore had opted to distract them with stunners while he used a combination between an _incarcerous_ and a _petrificus totalus_ to paralyze and bind them.

"Let us go!" shrieked Alma, her voice shrill and desperate, "Our baby...! We have to save our baby!"

"I am afraid, Miss Wade, that we can't allow you to do that. I promise to send people look for your son, if it is any consolation, but..."started Dumbledore, only to suddenly disappear in a swirl of flames and reappear twenty foot from there, with the other teachers.

Before anyone could ask _why_ Fawkes had suddenly flamed the aged wizard away, they saw a large crimson glow appear between the two teens, who, despite being still paralyzed, had managed to stand up, their eyes glowing with power from under the raven hair falling over their faces. Four eyes stared at the people present with open hatred, anger, fear and madness as the ropes binding them fell to the floor, reduced to ashes. Even those who had never been good at sensing magic could feel power rolling off the two teens in waves, as the air seemed to warp around them, forming shadowy shapes barely visible in the flickering light of the torches.

"I HATE YOU! I HATE YOU ALL! DIE!" shrieked Alma.

One of the prefects, who had been a few feet in front of the others, suddenly started _melting_ , his skin hissing as his screams told just how much pain he felt, until a few seconds later he died, leaving behind a blood-soaked skeleton that fell to the floor in a heap, the bones clattering in the suddenly silent corridor.

Many of the people present being teachers, had lived through the first war, and were old enough to remember the atrocities perpetrated by the Death Eaters, things that would make grown men whimper in fear. However, as a whole, the Death Eaters mostly made use of the Unforgivables, meaning that whenever someone was killed the corpse was in a perfectly preserved state. Only those attacked by the Dark Creatures under Voldemort's banner were in different states, the vampires' victims being drained of their blood with their throats sometimes cut open, and the werewolves' victims were mostly part-eaten or brutally maimed.

However, what had just happened was something so gruesome that most instantly associated it with the results of a _very_ Dark curse, one that would only be known by Inner Circle Death Eaters or Dark Wizards/Witches who had delved _very_ deep in the Dark Arts. The fact that Dumbledore had made sure that outside of those close to the Potters none knew that Harry and Alma were in fact unable to use magic, allowed for a massive misunderstanding to happen, as instead of trying to understand the pair's actions, they immediately labeled them as a Dark Wizard and Witch.

And of course, since the usual consensus about Dark Wizards was that they were better off dead or rotting in Azkaban, the wizards and witches present immediately took out their wands and started casting stunners and other "Light" spells at the two psionics. Unfortunately for them, neither Harry nor Alma tolerated being attacked, and as such they answered _violently_.

"Die! Die! DIE!"

As the crimson glow began to spread to the entire corridor, shapeless forms began crawling over the walls, their crimson eyes locked on the wizards present, who tried to destroy them, without much success as the spells went harmlessly through them. Panicked, the magic users began firing more dangerous spells, such as bone-breakers and _bombardas_ towards their faceless enemies.

By then the entire corridor was a battleground, with Harry and Alma in front of the locked doors facing the corridor, Dumbledore a few dozen feet away with Fawkes protecting him as he pecked the shades created by the two psionics, and behind the aged wizard, a group made of around six teachers (McGonnagal, Sprout, Snape, Flitwick, Aurora Sinistra and Madam Umbridge) and three prefects, all of them trying to fight off the apparitions.

"Harry! Cease this behavior immediately! We only want to help you!" pleaded Dumbledore, just as he avoided the strike from a four-legged creature with sharp teeth and crimson eyes.

"Dumbledore!" shrieked Umbridge, who was sending _Bombardas_ in every corner, sometimes almost hitting her colleagues, "The Ministry will hear of this! You will be sent to Azkaban for associating with these people! Stay back! I am Dolores Umbridge, the Senior Undersecretary of the Minister of Magic! I command you to stay back!"

As she screamed her orders, a pool of darkness appeared beneath her, and a grotesque creature appeared. It seemed to be only a torso, as it did not completely exit the void that had birthed it, a torso made of pale skin, with long, skeletal arms that ended up in arms with claw-like fingers that grabbed the toad-like witch's ankles as its' mouth opened to let out a piercing shriek. Its' head was devoid of any hair, and it had no eyes, the two of them apparently gouged out, while its' mouth was a dark hole littered with teeth made of rusted metal.

As Umbridge tried to cast a spell on the creature, it lunged at her, batting her wand away and creating deep slashes on the woman's torso, making her shriek and try to flee.

"NO! NO! I AM DOLORES UMBRIDGE, RELEASE ME THIS INSTANT, MONSTER! I COMMAND YOU TO STAY BAC-"

She was stopped mid-scream when her head suddenly exploded under the effect of a _bombarda_ coming from one of the prefects, who had begun holding his head and moaning, his eyes taking a slight crimson color as he mumbled incoherently. Soon the teenager was turning his wand on the other people present, and McGonnagal nearly saw her torso explode if it hadn't been for the shield hastily cast by a snarling Remus Lupin, who had joined the fray and was glaring hatefully at Harry and Alma. Had any bothered to look, they would have seen that his eyes were a bright yellow and slit, unlike his usually warm, pale green eyes.

"So I was right, there is really no redemption for you, Harry." he growled, showing his teeth. " _Bombarda maxima!_ "

The spell cast was several times stronger than what it should have been, mainly because at the moment the werewolf part of Remus was in control, and wanted nothing more than to destroy the threat it sensed. He had aimed at Harry, mainly because a small part of his mind didn't want to see the son of his best friend keep hurting people they knew, he wanted to release his soul and allow it to rest.

Since _Bombarda_ was invisible, Harry did not see it coming, although he could tell that _something_ was coming his way. Unfortunately, since he couldn't judge how fast the spell moved, he didn't move in time to dodge it. The explosion resulting from the spell sent him flying into the wall as a pained gurgle escaped his mouth along with some blood, the concussive force having shredded most of his internal organs.

"HARRY!"

 **-Break-**

Harry's entire world was pain. He had been careless, and hadn't expected anyone to send an invisible spell his way, as the norm seemed to be for spells to be visible bolts of light that he could easily destroy so long as he could see them. He had seen the tired-looking man snarl and wave his wand in his direction, but he had had no way to determine what kind of spell he had sent, or how fast it travelled. The only indication he had gotten that he had been hit was the sudden shockwave he had felt travel from his lower stomach to his entire torso, ripping his chest open and pulverizing his internal organs, turning them to paste. He could _feel_ his blood start travelling to places it wasn't supposed to as he vomited blood several times, the taste of iron lingering on his tongue.

Still, he refused to let things finish like that, not when neither he or Alma had experienced what life had to offer other than pain, not when they had a child to save, to raise and to care for. Even as his torn muscles protested, he tried to get up, his legs shaking as he held on the carvings on the wall for support. He looked around, although his vision was blurry and switching in and out. He could vaguely make out the shapes of the wizards, although at the moment there were no blurs of light that would have indicated they were still fighting.

As he stumbled, feeling weak from blood loss, his dimming vision caught sight of Alma, who was looking at him with an expression of abject horror on her beautiful face, her hand half-raised and reaching for him. Trying to smile, he tried to lift his own arm, struggling to lift the limb that felt like it was made of lead, his fingers twitching and trying to grasp the delicate, slender fingers of the woman he loved.

He wasn't a fool, spending so much time during his youth healing from the experiments he had to endure had allowed him to develop a keen knowledge of his own body, and he could tell that it was a miracle he wasn't already dead. Most of his internal organs were shredded, he suffered from internal bleeding, and his lungs were already filling with his own blood.

 _Alma...?_

 _Harry?! Please don't die! Don't leave me! I don't want to be alone again!_ begged Alma's mental voice, and he could feel her desperation as if it was his own.

 _Shhh...Everything's going to be alright...I promise..._

Then everything went black.

 **-Break-**

Alma Wade had never been exactly sane, as she had been able to sense negative emotions since her birth, a gift that had been turned into a curse when her father had discovered her unusual ability. Her childhood of being used as a guinea pig for experiments supposed to measure and/or improve her powers had also done her no favors when it came to mental stability, leaving her a very unstable person hating just about anyone.

She had been on the brink of complete insanity when she had "met" Harry. The only reason she could function somewhat normally in society was thanks to him, as otherwise she would be a very dangerous and unstable person. As it was, she was already in dire need of mental help, but she would have died before letting anyone try and ask her personal questions about her past.

Her relationship with Harry was unique, as he was the _only_ person she trusted, the only one she opened up to, and the only one she held any degree of affection for. Due to their powers, she pretty much knew that he felt much the same way for her, and it had allowed their relationship to grow to a level where they could have safely said that they loved each other. Unfortunately, due to their circumstances, they had never had the time nor the will to think about their relationship, too busy as they were to try and simply survive in a world where all the adults wanted to exploit them and their powers.

As she watched him slump to the ground, she felt the mental connection they kept up at all times disappear, leaving behind a dark void that threatened to devour what little was left of her sanity. She had _loved_ him, more than anyone else, save her baby, she had loved him so much she would have _died_ for him if she had thought a single instant that it would save him. And now he was dead, taken from her by people who tried to control their life again, who claimed it was for their own good. How was keeping them prisoners acting in their own interests? How?!

"HARRY! HARRY!"

Yet nothing but silence answered her. For a moment her crimson eyes lost their shine, becoming nothing but blank rubies, before she gave an agonized shriek, full of emotion, with so much hatred, anger and sadness that despite their rather precarious situations, several of the wizards and witches present paused in their actions and shivered.

Whipping her head towards the man who had sent the spell that had killed _her_ Harry, Alma shrieked, glaring at him as he was lifted off the ground. Several spells were sent her way, but all of them disappeared before even nearing her. She could have killed the tired-looking man easily, but she wanted him to suffer as he had made her suffer. She wanted to rip his heart out of his ribcage and crush it in front of his face, she wanted to break every bone in his body, she wanted to tear him to pieces to make him feel as she felt.

She tuned out the old man, who was already trying to convince her that killing the _monster_ who had taken Harry from her was wrong. Fool! She knew better! It was better to kill those that would harm you and your precious people before they could do anything to you, leaving them alive was just asking for trouble! If they had killed the scientists before _that_ day, they wouldn't have been put in a coma for over seven years, if they had killed them they wouldn't have had to _suffer_ half as much as they had! If they had killed that man, Harry would still be alive!

Glaring at the wizard who murdered Harry despite these people's claims that they wanted to protect him, she twitched a finger, and watched with sadistic satisfaction as the man saw the skin of his left arm be torn from his muscles, exposing them to the air as he screamed in agony. She knew _all_ about how to hurt people, after hers and Harry's experiences at the hands of the scientists of Armacham, and she had also spent countless hours learning everything she could by reading their minds, including, but not limited to, everything there was to know about the human body.

"Release Remus this instant, Miss Wade!" barked Dumbledore, his tone cold and no longer conceding. His wand was pointed straight at Alma, while a stream of water shaped like a whip whirled around him, protecting him from the apparitions she had summoned.

However, she was nowhere near rational at the moment. She had just lost her most precious person, killed in front of her by the _animal_ currently screaming in pain in her clutches, and she would damned if she didn't get her vengeance for Harry's death! She was entirely dedicated to a single purpose at the moment: making the man who had killed her beloved companion _pay_ for his actions. She didn't care that it had been his instincts speaking and that he regretted what he did, in the end his actions had spoken for him: he was an enemy, one that she needed to kill.

With a simple mental nudge, she was aware of all of the man's fears, everything that made him tick as she smiled wickedly. While physical torture was good, she wanted to reduce the _bastard_ who had taken her most precious person from her to a drooling vegetable, to have him live as nothing but a broken _animal_ for his crime against Harry. Only then would she feel vindicated. And if Dumbledore _dared_ stand in the way of her vengeance, she would make sure that he was taken care of, permanently. She might still want to go and free her son, but the old man had pushed her far enough that she was willing to antagonize the magic users' community if it meant that the meddling old man didn't bother her anymore.

She focused her power on the man's mind, and his howling immediately ceased as he started to tremble and moan in abject fear, his skin growing paler by the second as he stared wide-eyed at something none of the people present could see.

A spell then collided with her, sending her flying, and she could feel some if her ribs break as she cried out in shock and surprise. She had made sure to keep a barrier up to dispel any spell that they could have sent her way, so how...

As her vision dimmed, she felt tears fall from her eyes, tears of anger and frustration for being unable to take the life of the man who had taken Harry's life, and she swore that if she ever woke up in the castle again, she would make the people responsible for everything that had happened _pay_.

 **-Break-**

A weary Dumbledore sat in his throne-like armchair in his office, massaging his temples. It had been a disaster, a complete and utter disaster. Not only had Harry been killed, but his murderer was none other than Remus, and even if the man, now that he had somewhat recovered from what Alma had done to him, had profusely apologized to the Potters for his actions, citing his werewolf side momentarily taking control, his actions had damaged the long standing friendship between James and him badly.

Even if James hadn't cared for Harry nearly as much as his other children, as he unfortunately shared the same views than most Purebloods had on Squibs, and as such saw his son as an infirm, there was no doubt that he _had_ loved his son deeply, and that he resented his friend for killing him. This was without counting on Lily's reaction to the werewolf's actions, as she had nearly murdered him for killing her son, and James shared his wife's anger.

For the moment the Potters were sharing a family moment together, as they had decided to explain everything to their children since there was no need to worry about Harry's reaction to the existence of his siblings any longer. Both of them had been very upset by the news, especially Sirius who didn't even remember he had a twin. An unfortunate side effect of the news had been that the Boy-Who-Lived had suddenly distanced himself from him, accusing him of being responsible for his brother's death, something that he could hardly refute, much to his chagrin.

Unfortunately, he couldn't allow the Light to appear divided, they needed to be strong for the upcoming war with Voldemort, and while he wanted to let Sirius mourn the death of his twin, he planned to have a much needed discussion with him at the end of the week. He hoped that by allowing the teenager some much needed time to come to terms with what had happened, he would be easier to convince that what had happened saddened him as much as the upset boy.

This was the least of his worries at the moment though, as Umbridge's death had already been reported to the Minister, as well as Harry's and Alma's existence. As he had expected, Fudge had thrown one of his tantrums, and planned to come to Hogwarts himself with several Aurors and a Dementor escort to "make an example out of the Dark Witch who murdered an upstanding witch". It didn't matter that he had tried to make the man see reason, once he had decided something he stuck by it, no matter how idiotic some of his decisions could be. And while he would like nothing more than to let Alma go, since keeping her against her will was pointless now that Harry was dead, he knew that if she "escaped", Fudge would be quick to replace him as Headmaster of Hogwarts, something he couldn't afford since he knew his replacement would most likely be someone heavily on Voldemort's side.

As much as it pained him, Alma Wade had to be sacrificed for the Greater Good.

 **-Break-**

Alma blearily opened her eyes. Her entire body felt heavy, and she could easily tell that she was drugged, she recognized the familiar and loathed feeling of feeling weak and sleepy. For a moment, she thought that everything had been just a dream, after all how could magic exist? But then she tried to use the mental link she had with Harry to tell him about the odd dream she had just had when she realized it wasn't there. A few tears escaped her eyes when she realized that Harry really wasn't there, and she had to choke back a sob to not warn those she could vaguely hear speaking that she was awake.

She wanted to scream her anger and hatred, she wanted to _kill_ , to _hurt_ those who had taken Harry from her, and she would make sure that they would regret the day they had tried to mess with Alma Wade. However, even in her hate-filled state, she could tell that she was outnumbered and not in any state to fight God knew how many magic users at the same time. True, until then she and Harry had been going easy on them, as they had only wanted to escape, but even if she was to unleash her full fury on them she doubted she would be able to kill them all before she was once again knocked out, and she did not want to die there.

Straining her hearing, she could make out several voices arguing, several of which she recognized, and a few that she did not.

"...and I tell you, Albus, that I will not stand for this! This _thing_ killed my Undersecretary, a woman deeply respected in our community-" she heard someone scoff, "-and she will pay the price of her actions! I do not _care_ that you believe she can be given one of your famous "second chances", she will be Kissed!"

"It would seem, Cornelius, that you think you can take liberties with the law. I know my law, and even the Minister can't summarily sentence someone for the Kiss, no matter how grave their crimes may be. But it is not the first time you have done so, isn't it? I seem to recall that you had Bartemius Crouch Jr. summarily Kissed last year, when he could have told us much about Lord Voldemort's plans." icily replied the voice of Dumbledore, and Alma could _feel_ his irritation and anger rolling off in waves from the old man.

"This again? How many times are you going to try to convince me that You-Know-Who is back? There would be signs if he was!"

"Dumbledore has always had a tendency to...misinterpret things, Cornelius. Just ignore him for now, and let us go back to the matter at hand." interjected a smooth, silky voice.

She could see someone move, and she could vaguely make out a blotch of pale blonde over a dark robe as the people who talked walked closer to the bed she was restrained to. While she couldn't really see what the people who had apparently come for her looked like, she could easily feel the negative emotions coming from them.

She felt cold fingers lift her chin and she spat on the face of the person who had lifted her head to look in her eyes, disgusted by the lust she could feel coming from the man. She could tell right away that he was worse than even the scientists who had hurt her for Armacham, at the very least they had had _some_ form of reason for their actions. This man did things simply because he _could_ , because he _wanted_ to, and had the power to get away with the various things she could see glimpses of. Murder, torture, rape, he had performed all three more than enough times for her to be disgusted by the feeling of his fingers on her skin.

"Oh? Feisty little thing aren't you?" mocked the man, before his grip on her face became almost painful. "You would do well to remember to not anger your betters, _girl_. Not when they have your life in the palm of their hands."

"So this is the witch who killed my Undersecretary?" asked the man apparently called Cornelius. She was starting to see better now, probably because for some reason wizards' potions didn't seem to remain in effect for long in her organism.

"Actually, Cornelius," cut the man with the blonde hair, never releasing his hold on her face, "it seems that this girl isn't a witch. I have no idea how she obtained the powers the witnesses relayed to us, but I would bet on very Dark Rituals."

By now Alma was able to see the people present clearly. The man holding her face had a very effeminate look, which his robes and long blonde hair further accentuated. Unfortunately, what could have been a rather pretty androgynous face was fixed on a haughty sneer as cold, icy blue eyes stared down at her like one would a bug. A few feet away, a average looking man holding a bowler hat and sweating profusely was staring at her as if she was an abomination of the highest order. He was rather unremarkable, and she wondered how he had managed to get in a position of authority when he reminded her so much of the less remarkable scientists in Armacham, blindly following the order of their superiors like obedient dogs.

"W-what?!" spluttered Cornelius, taking a few steps back, "You mean she managed to steal someone's magic?! Why hasn't she been killed yet?! This is Dark Magic! It's illegal! She should have been killed already, Dumbledore! Aurors, execute her! Execute her now!"

Before any of the crimson-robed people could do anything, Dumbledore drew himself to his full height, and _glared_ at the stuttering and sweating Fudge, making the man squeak and hide behind one of the Aurors he had brought.

"Once again, Cornelius, you seem to forget that you cannot summarily order the execution of someone, and if you persist in wanting to sentence Miss Wade to death without giving her a proper trial, I am afraid I _will_ intervene."

"A trial?" spluttered the man, looking aghast at the very idea. "Are you _mad_?! What do you think the people would say if they learnt I had left someone who had found a way to steal magic live?! I would be sacked!"

As the two men argued back and forth, Alma felt the effects of the potions lessen, slowly at first, but then faster and faster. Soon, she was confident that she could move just as well as if she hadn't been drugged, and tried testing her motor skills, something she had learnt to do whenever she was drugged in her youth. She carefully began moving her fingers and toes, trying to see if their response was in any way delayed, and once she was done with her tests, she acted.

 **-Break-**

Lucius couldn't believe his luck. Not only was the twin of the Brat-Who-Lived dead, he had been killed by Remus Lupin himself! He could already see the many laws he would be able to have his "friend" Fudge push forward, for the good of the wizardry community of course. It was clear that if one of the werewolves most known for trying to repress his animal side had lost control and killed the Potter Squib, then _any_ werewolf could lose control at any moment, and as such, that they should be banned from mingling with proper wizards and witches.

Then, there was the fact that the Potter Squib had seemingly brought with him a beautiful young woman, one that he felt he was entitled to have some fun with once his Lord was done with her. Her skin was silky and pale, while her hair was of the darkest black, and her face was very delicate, despite the hateful snarl that marred it. This of course, was nothing compared to her figure, a slim and slender body with narrow hips but rather large breasts for one her age. All of this made her look like the perfect Pureblood heiress, save for the one detail that he could have gone without. The crimson eyes glaring at him made him definitively uneasy, as the only _other_ crimson eyes he knew belonged to the Dark Lord himself, and having such eyes staring at him was enough to make him feel as if Lord Voldemort himself was judging him.

So busy was he thinking about what he would do once the girl was in his grasp, that he almost missed the sudden narrowing of her eyes, as she whipped a hand towards him. Yet thanks to his countless hours of fighting in the War, he was able to notice the subtle hints before she acted, and as such had instinctively moved out of the area the girl had been aiming for, despite knowing that she couldn't use magic. He was almost ready to berate himself for moving uselessly, when a searing pain made him look down at his left arm, only to find a bleeding stump where it had once been.

For a moment he could only stare in shock at what had happened, before he grit his teeth as the pain hit, and that he turned towards the girl, who was already stepping out of bed, having already disregarded him.

"You stupid little whore! _Avada kedavra_!"

It was with a certain satisfaction that he saw the girl look up, but she only had the time to widen her eyes before the Killing Curse slammed into her, making her collapse like a puppet whose strings had just been cut.

However, his satisfaction was instantly doused when he realized that in his anger, he had used the Killing Curse, and in front of Dumbledore _and_ Fudge no less! While he was confident that he _could_ have Obliviated the Minister of the incident, as he had done in several occasions, the man being pathetically weak-minded, he seriously doubted that the old coot would let him do so, not when there were witnesses to his actions.

As he felt his body freeze under the effects of an immobilization spell, he cursed as he realized that even if his Lord broke him out of Azkaban, he would most likely be humiliated, if not outright killed to show what happened to those who failed the Dark Lord.

 **-Break-**

Dumbledore sighed as he took off his glasses and rubbed his eyes. Things were getting out of hand, and nothing was working as he had hoped.

First, there was the matter of Sirius Potter, who still refused to even talk to him when it wasn't related to schoolwork, although at the very least he managed to send messages to the boy through his parents , who were trying to get him to open up to him again. It was capital that Sirius and him be on good terms, as he needed the boy to help him destroy Voldemort's Horcruxes, and eventually, sacrifice himself in the last battle against the Dark Lord, although he seriously doubted he would still be there to witness it. He had never told the Potters that their son had to die for the Prophecy to be fulfilled, as he knew very well that such an information would make them even more protective of Sirius, and more than likely cut all ties with him. Not that he couldn't understand of course, he really wished there was another way to interpret the Prophecy, but he hadn't found one, even after trying for over a decade. Still, progress was slow but steady in this case.

Second, the murder of Alma Wade by Lucius Malfoy. He had hoped that the use of the Killing Curse in front of Fudge would have made the man realize just what kind of people he associated with, but apparently the Minister was too thickheaded to see what was in front of him, as he had tried to exonerate the man, claiming he had been acting in self-defense. Thankfully, Amelia Bones had prevented him from doing so, as she had pointed out that he could have simply Stunned the girl instead of killing her. Now, Lucius Malfoy was rotting in Azkaban after a rushed trial, but Fudge was still Minister, and worse, he was still refusing to see the truth. Worse, his actions had become erratic at best, since now he had nobody to advise him, Umbridge being dead and Lucius incarcerated. Any other person trying to fill the spot left by the two was submitted to a thorough background search, a measure that Amelia had insisted upon and had managed to have approved, since her two biggest obstacles to the ear of the Minister were now gone.

Thirdly, with Lucius confessing under Veritaserum that Voldemort was indeed back, there was panic amongst the population, a mad frenzy of people suddenly locking themselves in their houses and putting their wards up for everyone, even the members of their own families by fear of Imperiused relatives. The panic was such that people only ever went out when they had no other choice, and even then they quickly did what they had to do before going home. This was only worsened by the fact that Voldemort was now acting overtly, his cover having been blown by one of his own men. Packs of werewolves roamed the British wilderness, preying on everything they came across, vampires were feeding without bothering to clear their tracks, and Dementors were breeding like crazy.

And finally, the cause of his current headache, ever since Harry and his friend had died, two weeks earlier, _something_ had seemed to take residence inside the castle. Students had suddenly come to their Head of Houses about feeling constantly nauseous and hearing voices in their heads. Strangely, even the ghosts, who by all means shouldn't be affected at all due to their situation, seemed to be on edge, as even Peeves, who usually couldn't go _an hour_ without playing a prank on someone, had not done anything for the last week and a half, and even then his prank had seemed more out of habit than anything else. When asked for the reason of their uneasiness, the answer of most of the ghosts was to say that they didn't know, although a few had paled and refused to answer.

He had tried to look into it, of course. He had expected the situation to be of Voldemort's making, but he had failed to find anything that could prove him right, and the few students he knew were in contact with the Dark Lord, but that he had allowed back to try and redeem them, seemed unaware of anything. Of course, he had made the connection with the death of Harry Potter and Alma Wade, as the happenings had started soon after their untimely deaths, but he doubted they had the skill, power and wish to affect Hogwarts so. With the life they had led, he was quite sure that they were eager to start the next grand adventure instead of remaining as shades of themselves, something that only wizards and witches could do anyway.

No, it had to be Voldemort's doing.

...Right?

 **-Break-**

It was at Parting Feast that things reached a climax. The apparitions had terrified the students enough that they now moved only in groups, and even then it was only to go to classes, otherwise they did everything in their respective Common Rooms. Despite the staff's efforts (which were meager at best, since most were focused on the upcoming War with Voldemort), nobody had been able to find any clue about what caused the apparitions, although a select few had an idea of what they meant.

The mood had been somber in the school since the revelation of Voldemort's return, as many knew, or at least understood, that their lives were now in danger at all times. The fact that several Slytherins had begun to boast that they would be serving the Dark Lord soon didn't help the other students to feel confident in their safety, nor did the increased number of fights between muggleborns and Pureblood fanatics. The teachers were hardly ever able to help their students, as most were already getting ready for the inevitable war, as well as trying to see if the apparitions that had been plaguing the castle weren't the Dark Lord's work.

As Dumbledore stood up to make his customary end of year speech, every single candle in the Great Hall suddenly flickered and died out, plunging the entire room in the darkness.

Before chaos could break out, Dumbledore fired a canonblast charm, which quieted whatever protests or screams of surprise could have come from the students.

"Everyone, stay calm and don't move. Prefects, until were are back, you are responsible for the safety of your housemates. The teachers and I will check what may have caused this disturbance."

"Oh, there is no need for that, Dumbledore." purred a voice, while dark chuckles could be heard, and the candles were lighted again.

Standing in the middle of the Great Hall was the subject of many wizards' and witches' nightmares, the Darkest Wizard to ever be born in Great Britain, the Dark Lord Voldemort. Now that the light was back, many could see the appearance of the man who had terrorized Wizardry Britain for over a decade, leading a campaign of terror against the magical community.

Clad in pitch black robes of the best facture, the man (if he could even be called a man anymore) stood tall, leading a group of over twenty Death Eaters with him. His face was eerily similar to the one of a snake, with no facial hair, and no visible nose, merely slits for nostrils, and deep crimson eyes. This gave the Dark Lord a very eerie appearance, which, coupled with his straight, confident posture, made for a very intimidating sight as he twirled his wand almost lazily between his pale, long fingers.

"Surprised to see me, Dumbledore? Don't be. With your stupid belief that everyone can be redeemed, it was very easy to have one of the students lead us in. He was quite adamant in doing so, too. Apparently he blamed you for the emprisonment of his father. A shame, really. Lucius was quite useful to me."

At that, many heads turned to look at Draco Malfoy, the son of Lucius Malfoy. Many had known him as an arrogant, Pureblood fanatic, who was powerless to do anything by himself and relied mostly on his father to get what he wanted. It came at a shock to many that the now sneering blond would go so far as betray everyone in Hogwarts simply to get his vengeance.

For his part, Voldemort seemed to delight in the shock on the staff's faces, especially on Dumbledore's, who while he had known that Draco was prime Death Eater material, had still been convinced he could make the boy see how wrong the path he was taking was.

"Surprised? For you, who believes that everyone deserves a _second_ _chance_ , "sneered Voldemort, "you must be appalled that one of your own students would let us inside the castle."

Dumbledore's face betrayed nothing though, as he fixed his once student with a cool glare.

"I will freely admit that I expected better from mister Malfoy, but I believe you are not here to discuss our opinions on young Draco's choices?"

"Ha!" cackled Bellatrix Lestrange, as she sauntered over to stand right behind her Lord, looking around with a sneer on her face, her eyes gleaming with madness. "Is old Dumblie afraid that we'll hurt his students? Don't worry, if they're smart, they won't try anything, and we won't have to discipline them! Of course, we can't promise anything about the Mudbloods..."

"Now, now, Bella." chided the Dark Lord, his smirk never leaving his face. It was clear to all those that were watching him that the man was reveling in the feeling of having bested Dumbledore, who was supposed to be the only man he had ever feared. "We _might_ be more magnanimous if you surrendered now, Dumbledore... I don't need to tell you what would happen if you try to fight us, do I?"

"I see you still underestimate me, Tom..." started the old man, only for Voldemort to lose his smirk and conjure a large snake made of Fiendfyre, making it slither until it was almost touching the Gryffindor table.

"DON'T CALL ME TOM!" he roared, before composing himself, although barely, "The nexxxxt time you _dare_ call me that accurssssed name, we will sssseeee how well your precioussss Gryffindorssss and your Golden Boy like having Fiendfyre burning their ssskin..."

With an evil smile, he motioned to Bellatrix, who cackled and rushed to execute the unspoken order, as she dragged a very pale but stony-faced Sirius Potter in front of her Lord, mocking him all the while.

"Ooohh? Is ickle baby Potter too scared to make threats? Hmmm?" she grinned, her fingers prodding and pinching the teenager's face as his parents glared at the woman mistreating their son, unable to do anything lest their child die.

"The _Boy-Who-Lived_." sneered the Dark Lord. "Your champion seems awfully tense, Dumbledore."

"Leave my son alone, you maniac!" snarled Lily Potter, only to narrowly avoid a nasty-looking dark purple curse sent her way by a glaring Bellatrix.

"Watch your tone with the Dark Lord, Mudblood!" she hissed, grabbing Sirius's chin as her painfully sharp nails dug into his skin, breaking it and making small drops of blood to fall from the shallow cuts." Or I might just decide to use ickle baby Potter to teach you a lesson!"

"Now, now, Bella." chided Voldemort, although his stare never moved from Dumbledore, "We can't kill him just now, first he must wish to see me kill his _esteemed_ Headmaster. From what I have understood, he was the one responsible for killing your brother, Harry, wasn't he?"

Startled mutters and whisperings echoed in the room, as many had not known that the _Boy-Who-Lived_ had a brother. A sister, yes, but a brother? Definitively not. For those who could see the "Chosen One's" expressions, the reminder of Harry's death made him grit his teeth as he glared at Voldemort.

"That is a good look, _Potter_. I will enjoy seeing it change to despair once it is your turn to die." smirked Voldemort, his snake-like nostrils flaring momentarily.

The Dark Lord then stepped forward, and was about to speak again when the candles' flames were suddenly blown again, plunging the room into darkness again, confusing and surprising even the Death Eaters this time.

"My Lord?" asked a few of them, visibly nervous.

"What isss it?" hissed the snake-like man, who had already conjured green flames at the tip of his wand, illuminating the Great Hall with a sickly green light, and making the shadows stretch and warp disturbingly. "Who daresss ruin my moment of glory? Sssshow yourssselvess, impudent weaklingsss! I'll ssshow you how Lord Voldemort treatsss those who dare mock him!"

 **-Break-**

It started with a giggle. In the Great Hall, the sound of a little girl's giggles filled the air, making the hair of most people present stand on end at how creepy and out of place the sound was. The fact that the eerily green flames created by Voldemort seemed to flicker following the giggles and made the shadows appear monstrous didn't help the nerves of the few who were not already on the verge of having a panic attack.

"Ssshow yourssselvesss!" snarled Voldemort, who made the mistake of turning his back on Dumbledore.

In an instant, the old wizard had sent a disarming spell towards the Dark Lord, making the man's wand fly towards him, only to suddenly stop in the air, hovering about two feet in the air, spinning a few times and then bursting into flames as the Dark Lord snarled at his old teacher, obviously angry with himself at having lost his nerve and his wand so fast.

"Now, Tom," started Dumbledore, who was looking slightly worried, his wand out as he took a few steps forward," surrender and face the consequences of your actions-"

However, before the headmaster could speak another word, his own wand burst into flames, and it was only thanks to the reflex of releasing his grip on it that he did not suffer severe burns on his wand hand. The burst of flames was also followed by another fit of giggles, as well as a few snickers from what could only be a young boy, although it was hard to tell.

"Who is here? Show yourself!" snarled Voldemort again, as sweat marred his brow, and he had to cancel out the Fiendfyre construct he had created lest it become too taxing to control it and that it try to turn on him.

Another giggle, this time at the entrance of the Great Hall, made all the people present turn towards the source of the noise, although the Death Eaters were careful to not show their backs to the staff, knowing that doing so would not end well for them.

Standing at the entrance of the Great Hall, was a young girl, maybe seven or eight. Her hair was so black it seemed to suck in the light around it, and fell on her face in dark strands covering most of her face, reaching the middle of her chest. She was clad in a crimson dress, or so it looked with the meager light provided by the flames created by Voldemort, and her skin looked far too pale to be healthy. But the detail that struck most minds were the twin crimson orbs staring at the people present from underneath the dark bangs, so similar to those of the Dark Lord.

Next to her was a boy of the roughly the same age, with the same pitch black hair. But where the girl's hair was sleek and smooth, his own seemed to stick out at odd angles, much like the one of a certain Potter. He was wearing a faded medical gown, showing a rather thin-looking body, while his deep green eyes were glaring at those present, as if their mere presence was an irritation of the highest order for him.

With an angry hiss, a large snake, that most had not noticed as it had been hidden by the Death Eaters' robes, launched itself towards the pair, with more than a few of the witches present crying out in alarm. However, the snake never reached its' goal, as a few feet from the two children, it seemed to stop in the air as its' flesh began to bubble, and soon fell on the ground, in the form of a blood-soaked skeleton whose flesh had melted into several disgusting blobs of matter.

"NAGINI!" hissed the Dark Lord, livid, "Die!" he snarled, as flames burst from his fingers, intent on devouring the pair.

Once again, the attack was stopped, as the flames bounced harmlessly on some invisible shield and died out, leaving the pair unscathed. By now, most of the Death Eaters were beginning to worry as their Lord had lost his wand, and seemed unable to harm the strange children in any way. They had followed him because he was powerful, and that they were sure of his strength, sure that any obstacle in his way would be overcome. But now they were faced with opponents who did not seem afraid of their Lord's power, and that he was unable to kill.

"Who are you?" asked someone, although for those who would have watched Dumbledore, they would have seen horrified recognition painted on his face.

"Alma." was the answer from the girl, in a flat tone that chilled the bones.

" _Harry_." spoke the boy, as his voice was heard into the heads of all those present.

"Impossible." whispered Dumbledore, as he twitched his fingers, as if to summon his now burnt wand. "You are dead. Both of you are dead. You cannot be alive!"

The girl tilted her head to the side, seemingly confused.

"Of course we're dead. _You_ killed us."

"Lies!" snarled a Gryffindor. "Dumbledore never killed anyone!"

However, his angry shout died in his mouth as crimson orbs peered into his, mere inches away from his face, as Alma crouched on the Gryffindor table, staring at his face. The students next to where she had suddenly appeared staggered back in fright, terrified of the girl who looked like some form of vengeful apparition.

"Really?"

The confusion in the young girl's voice was so genuine that most felt unnerved by her apparently erratic behavior, at least before she asked:

"But he was the one who brought us here, right? And it was one of his friends who killed my Harry."

Her words, spoken in a clearly questioning tone, made most turn towards the old man, questions clear in their gazes.

"It was a regrettable accident, Miss Wade, I assure you. Remus was not himself, otherwise he would never have harmed Harry. This I can swear to you. I would be happy to discuss the matter with you later, but for now I am afraid I am busy with a former student who lost his way. Maybe afterwards we could discuss things in my office?"

The old man had barely finished speaking that he was flung into a wall, screaming in pain as the air was forcefully forced out of his lungs.

" _I died because of you_." growled Harry, who had taken a few steps forward. " _We won't speak to you. Not now. Not ever. Die!"_

 **-Break-**

It was a slaughter. No matter how powerful they were or how much they outnumbered the two psionics, the wizards and witches were simply _too weak_ to even begin to offer a challenge to the pair now that they no longer held back. Unlike before, they met the magic users head on, destroying their spells with little effort and summoning eldritch abominations from their private dimension, who then attacked everything in sight, tearing it to shreds or getting killed as they tried.

The Death Eaters were among the first to die, since both Harry and Alma could feel how disgusting their minds were, and did not want to feel said minds any longer. Some were melted, leaving behind the same kind of blood-soaked skeletons than the attack on Nagini had left, others were torn to shreds by the spectral apparitions summoned, and others still were reduced to vegetables under the onslaught of their mental power. Voldemort himself belonged to the last category, as his efforts to make himself immortal had been duly noted by the pair, however said efforts had a rather large flaw. Maybe he _was_ immortal, in some very twisted way, now, however, his Horcruxes, the pieces of his soul he had scattered over the country, did nothing to keep his mind sane. It was almost disappointingly easy to crush what little was left of the Dark Lord's sanity, to erase everything that had made him into what he was currently. All that was left of the man who had brought Wizardry Britain to its' knees was a drooling idiot, whose mind was now more akin to a vast void than the heavily fortified castle it had been before Harry had _burst_ into it, tearing it to shreds so numerous and so small that even they wouldn't be able to reconstruct it anymore.

Of course, the Death Eaters weren't the only ones who died. Alma had been _very_ angry with Dumbledore and the staff for letting Harry get killed, and for trying to keep them cooped inside the castle. Harry had also been _extremely_ pissed that they had allowed the girl/woman who meant more to him than anyone else, get killed when he himself had died on their watch hours earlier. Of course, the fact that both knew that the old man had been willing to basically sell Alma to the Minister so long as she was given a trial, even trumped, simply to keep his position, had infuriated them to no end as well.

Dumbledore had, as thus, been the prime target of their ire, his mind getting progressively broken by the powerful mental attacks of the two psionics, and all those who had tried to help the old man had been dealt with in a very violent manner, more often than not ending squashed or having their flesh melted by the same attack that had taken out Voldemort's snake. They had also had, of course, needed to kill most of the staff, as surprisingly most members seemed to be members of the old man's "Order", which had been those who had tried to prevent them from leaving and looking for their child.

Now, they were standing in the middle of the Great Hall, the Potters facing them with their wands out. They had kept Harry's "parents" for last, as they both had a bone to pick with them for abandoning the psionic when he was a child. Oh, they could understand their reasoning, but that didn't mean they could _accept_ it!

As the two pairs glared at each other (although the Potters seemed rather hesitant at the moment), a worried-looking Sirius interposed himself between the four of them.

"Wait!"

He was joined by a terrified but also resolute-looking Ivy, who stood next to her older brother, between her parents, her somehow alive _other_ older brother, and the girl whom from what she had heard was something like said older brother's girlfriend.

Seeing their parents ready themselves to launch spells at a moment's notice, and the psionic pair tense up in reaction, they cried out:

"Wait/Please wait!"

It was Sirius who spoke first, as he turned to look at his twin's younger form, his face reflecting his mixed emotions. He felt so much, he didn't know how to express it. Relief to see Harry somewhat alive, sadness that he had apparently died, worry that he would hate him, every feeling warred with the others, making it hard for the Gryffindor to find his words.

"Hello, Harry, and Alma. I'm not sure you know who I am, so I'll just introduce myself, I guess." he started, gulping when Harry glared at him, as did Alma. "I'm Sirius Potter, your brother, your twin Mom said. I think I've always known you existed, I always felt like there was something missing in my life."

Seeing Harry's eyes narrow, although he didn't do anything, Sirius took it as a sign and continued speaking, his voice echoing in the silent Great Hall. During the fight, the students had all huddled as far away from it that they could, those who could fleeing the Hall, while those who couldn't leave without getting too close retreating to the furthest corners of the room.

"I can't say I know what you've lived through, or that I understand how angry you are, because if I was in your place, I guess I'd be just as angry as you are. But please don't kill Mom and Dad. They made a mistake, a very big one, when they gave you away, but they thought you'd be happier like that. True, you weren't, but they couldn't know about that. The only thing you can _really_ blame them for is for not checking on you, I mean they had no idea of what would happen when they left you with Aunt Petunia. But they are _our_ parents, so please, don't kill them!"

 **-Break-**

Harry was feeling conflicted, something he was not used to. Most of his life, he had a clear idea of what he wanted and how to get it, and he had never had any qualms about doing what he needed to, even when it meant hurting or killing people. Even when he had killed the other wizards and witches, he hadn't been conflicted, as he knew very well that they were people who would either try to kill him, or try to keep him caged, locked away from the world.

However, this was about murdering his _parents_ , not that he considered either of the two as such. He had had all the time he needed to peer through their minds, to look up everything he needed to know about them, about how they felt about abandoning him. His father had shown rather little concern about him, but from what he had learnt from the man's mind, showing any concern at all about him despite his status was already a rarity in the Wizardry World. Still, it wasn't like the man didn't deserve to die in his mind.

It was his mother who made the choice harder than it should be. He had seen, _felt_ how torn and how sad she had been about leaving him to her sister. He knew that the only reason she had agreed to do so was because she had been convinced, believed with one hundred percent certainty, that it was the best choice for him to live a happy life. He had felt how absolutely despaired she had been when she had learnt he had disappeared, how she had wasted away until her husband had given her a wake-up call about her duty to her other children.

In many ways, Lily Potter was a perfect mother, one who had not hesitated to stand in front of a man she knew she had no way of defeating, simply to save her children's lives, and that when she was only in her early twenties. Then, even when she was dealing with the fact that one of her twins was famous and would be hailed as the second coming of Merlin, she had thought about was best for him, instead of just keeping him with his family, where he would have grown up in a less than ideal environment. He knew that if he had stayed, that he would have felt bitter that his twin was famous, that his twin had magic and that he didn't. And, in a way, if Lily hadn't given him away, he would never have met Alma.

" _Harry?"_

With a gaze, he knew that Alma thought like him. While they didn't like leaving people alive like this, as there was a good chance that someone would try to track them down for the murder of the members of the staff and of the Death Eaters, they couldn't really kill everyone in the Great Hall either. And killing the Potters, while it would certainly make him feel better, would leave his brother and little sister orphans, something he did not wish on anyone.

Glaring at the Potters, he raised his hand.


	2. Good End

**-Epilogue-**

 **-Good End-**

Harlan growled as he watched over the video feeds of the cameras scattered around the base. Ever since his subjects' mysterious disappearance, he had been keeping an eye on the first subject born of Project Origin, Harry's and Alma's son. So far the child had yet to exhibit any kind of psychic power, but he was confident that it would come in time. Alma herself was almost a demigoddess when it came to psychic powers, and she had only begun showing symptoms of her powers around three years old. He didn't know when Harry had started using his powers, but at four he was more or less equal to Alma, so Harlan was willing to bet that he had started developing his powers around three as well.

He had taken a lot of abuse from Armacham's higher ups, as they blamed him for their precious subjects' disappearance, no matter how much data proved that there had been nothing he could have done to prevent what had happened. The fact that the mysterious energy that had disrupted the force field had completely different readings from the psychic powers shown by either Harry or Alma was worrying, as it was something completely different from what he had already encountered. As a man of science, he was already stretching his mind to accept the idea of psychic powers, so if this energy was not a psychic phenomenon, what was it?

Since he had no idea of _where_ Harry and Alma were, he had had to resort to patience, knowing full well that Alma would _never_ let her son (his grandson) stay with him, and that she would come to get him herself, Harry in tow. As such, he had relocated the still unnamed baby boy to a room in the Vault facility, and had made sure to prepare said room for the eventual arrival of the two psionics. The room was a trap of his design, made to seal itself and fill with soporific gas the moment it detected the slightest hint of psychic ability used. And in case it wasn't enough, special darts would be shot from autonomous turrets that would surge from the walls, with a tranquillizer specially designed to knock out the two freaks of nature. Security was airtight, and nothing would get past the guards without alerting them, which meant that by the time Alma and Harry reached the room in which their son could be found, he would be ready with an assault team. The guards who would try to slow down the pair hadn't been briefed on his plan, as he had no intention of allowing them to read the men's mind and escape him again.

Still, it had been a while since they had escaped, and they had yet to resurface anywhere, even there. Was it possible that he had misjudged Alma, that she would allow her son to be experimented on as a replacement of sorts?

An explosion was the answer to his wordless question, and he felt his guts clench in anticipation for the success of his plan. With Alma and Harry back at Armacham, he would no longer be the corporation's black sheep, he would be their lead scientist again! With the data provided by the three subjects, Alma, Harry, and their son, he would be able to create an army of psionics!

"Hello, Harlan."

To his credit, Harlan didn't jump, as most people would have. Instead, he merely turned to look at Alma, although he had trouble masking his shock at seeing her. When he had last seen her, she had been a human skeleton, her skin stretching over her bones, white and clammy, while her hair was a mess, only just managing to look like hair thanks to the annual cuts done by one of the scientists.

The teenager he had in front of him was a far cry from the frail form he had seen only a few weeks ago, and his mind struggled to comprehend how Alma could have recovered from her years in the Vault so fast, and so _well_. Had she played in Snow White, she would have made quite the princess, her sickly pale skin was still pale, but of a more healthy sort, while her hair was clearly clean and straightened well. Her chest had filled up, giving her the look of an alluring young woman, although she was still quite clearly a teenager. She no longer wore her telltale crimson dress, one of his few presents to her. Now she was clad in black jeans, with a crimson top that clung to her curves, and her feet were clad in leather boots that from what little experience he had with shopping, were probably _very_ expensive.

"Alma." he greeted.

It may seem a little cold, but he had no idea of what to do, of how to greet his daughter. While he _did_ want to use her for his own ends, a rather large part of him regretted that she had to suffer so much for the sake of his ambitions. Of course, the world wasn't an ideal place, so the more sentimental part of him was kept on a short leash.

"Where is our son?" she asked, her tone serious and more than a little threatening, as the furniture in the office began to hover in the air and that a dull crimson glow began to appear from behind her.

"Where is Harry?" he asked, "I thought he would be with you. Do I have to understand that he doesn't care about his son?"

The words had barely left his lips when he was lifted in the air, Alma's hand crushing his throat as her crimson orbs glared at her father. While she was just a teen, her psychic powers granted her _much_ more strength than the average teenage girl, and she was certainly not afraid to use said strength.

"Harry is better than you, and he'll make an excellent father. He's killing the guards at the moment, and then _we_ are going to get our son, with or _without_ your help. So WHERE IS HE?!" she yelled.

Now Harlan was not a stupid man. He could tell right away that there was _no way_ Alma would let herself be captured, not when she had probably already read his mind, and was asking the question out of pure principle. He could either tell her, and possibly stay alive, with the knowledge that Armacham would most likely make him pay for his failure in getting back what they viewed as assets that _belonged_ to them, or he could refuse, and die painfully.

"I'll talk!" choked Harlan, "I'll talk! He's in a special room-grrkk!" he choked again, as Alma's grip tightened upon hearing about a _special_ room.

"I swear _Harlan,_ " she growled, "If you did _anything_ to my son, I will make you regret the day you chose to take him from me!"

"No! I didn't do anything! He was-grrkkk! Too young!"

After a few moments of leaving the man choke, Alma released him, allowing Harlan to fall to the ground and put an arm on his throat, massaging it to ease the pain of his trachea.

"Show me. And if you lied, I promise I'll make your death hurt more than you could possibly imagine." hissed the young psionic.

 **-Break-**

As Harry and Alma left the Vault facility, they didn't pay any mind to the corpses of the guards scattered everywhere around them, nor did they show even the slightest amount of surprise at the sound of the explosions rocking the building. It had been a very easy decision to blow the entire complex up, as they didn't want it to be used again, nor did they want to leave a reminder of their past intact.

However, at the moment, they were too busy staring at their son, who was cooing and giggling at his mother, who, for the first time in _ages_ , showed a genuine smile on her face as she played with the son who had been taken from her. Harry was watching from next to Alma as the baby played with her raven locks, putting some in his mouth and making a face.

" _He's got your hair."_ he smiled, putting a hand on his _fiancée's_ shoulder.

"And he has your eyes." softly said fiancée, never looking up. "He's _perfect_." she whispered, and Harry could hear her elation and happiness in her voice. Her arms were cradling the newborn protectively, with all the care and tenderness one could expect from a mother holding their child, and Harry knew that Alma would make an excellent mother, teenager or not. What mattered was not the age, but the willingness to care for your offspring, and the woman of his life had it in spades. Even if neither of them had parents to ask for advice, they would do their best and raise their son with the care and love that they had been deprived of as children.

They had all the time in the world to do so, now that Harlan was dead, and that the Potters (the parents) had seen their memory wiped and carefully rearranged to make them believe that Harry was dead for good. Now that Sirius had managed to have his name erased from the family tapestry, there was nothing left to lead the wizards to them, as he had carefully wiped the memory of every person present in the Great Hall the night he had killed Voldemort and Dumbledore, erasing all traces of his presence from their minds, rewriting them to make them believe that it was Sirius who had killed the Dark Lord, in a battle that had taken place inside the castle. His brother had also given him a large amount of money taken from his vault, saying that he didn't need it and that he would probably get a lot more soon for being the one to "off the Dark Bastard". Since wizards used pure gold to make their Galleons, they had about twenty millions dollars US to spend, more than enough to buy a house and start a normal life, like they had wished they could do so many times.

All that was left was to kill the last members of Armacham who knew of their existence, and they would be free to live as they wanted. Alma planned on being a stay at home wife, as she didn't see the need to work, and would rather spend her time with their son than working. He himself didn't really need to work, as he could simply go to a casino and cheat his way to the jackpot in card games for example, but he wanted to learn. There were so many things he wanted to know, that he had been unable to learn from the minds of the scientists.

Even if they were technically dead, they didn't plan on passing on for a long, _long_ time.


	3. Bad End

**Here is the long awaited Bad End to _Blood is not family_ , I hope you will like it. I will warn you though, it is _very_ dark, so don't come complaining to me if you read it. I'm not entirely satisfied with it either, but I couldn't write anything better for the moment**

 **For those who are interested in musics that might fit the story's atmosphere, I wrote the entire story while listening to these few musics:**

 _ **Hate the day**_ **\- Behind the scene  
**

 ** _Destroyer_ -The Birthday Massacre (their other musics tend to fit quite well too)**

* * *

 **I don't own Harry Potter or F.E.A.R.**

* * *

 **-Epilogue-**

 **-Bad end-**

A lonely figure stood at the edge of what had once been the small, wizardry village of Hogsmeade. What had once been a settlement bustling with life was now little more than a ghost town, with houses left abandoned. Despite the magic that should have kept the habitations in good shape, most were already in an advanced state of disrepair, as if something had corrupted the very _air_ itself, slowly eating away at the wood and paint. Wild weeds were sprouting everywhere, yet no flower, nothing save useless, barren grass, seemed to be able to grow.

It had already been over a decade since the death of Lord Voldemort, but unlike what people had thought, said day had not been one of celebration, but one of mourning. On the day the Dark Lord was finally killed, so had been almost three quarters of Hogwarts' students, irrevocably crippling the British magical society. Yet the death of the students had only been the beginning, as those who had fled the castle to save their lives had told the Ministry of the responsible for the massacre, two _abominations_ who took the form of a pair of teenagers, one with deep green eyes, and the other with crimson ones.

The team of Unspeakables and Aurors sent to exorcise or capture whatever the apparitions had been had never returned, and neither had the following ones. After the casualties reached the eighties, the Ministry had no choice but to abandon the idea of reclaiming the castle, lest they end up crippling the population even further. Hogsmeade had, at the time, been considered safe, as the abominations seemed content to settle in Hogwarts. However, as time went by, more and more residents of the village had begun to experience chronic headaches, waves of nausea and dizzy spells. Most had become very paranoid, jumping at the slightest noise, and many had been speaking of shadows shifting strangely, beings roaming the area at night that devoured whoever they caught.

Eventually, most had decided to move, the very few left deciding to stubbornly stay having devolved into shadows of their former selves, screaming and stuttering messes whispering about voices in their heads, worshipping the very beings responsible for their states, as well as their spawn, a child with raven hair and deep orange eyes. The few who had tried to explore the area had either never returned, or refused to speak of what they had seen, never setting a foot outside of their homes at night.

The figure eventually left the village, walking away before the few degenerate inhabitants could sense their presence and try to capture them, either to eat them or to sacrifice to their "Gods". They had a meeting scheduled, and they couldn't afford to be late.

 **-Break-**

From outside, little had changed about the castle, it still stood tall and proud, as it had done for the last centuries. However, if one who was familiar with the building before it was taken over by Harry Potter and Alma Wade set foot inside it, they would have noticed a startling difference. Where before the air seemed saturated with magic, brimming with power, the almost sentient force gently brushing against those that could use it, it now felt empty, _dead_. Instead of a warm feeling of safety, a visitor would feel as if something beyond their comprehension was sneering at them from the shadows, waiting for the right moment to break their mind and corrupt their body.

No matter the hour of the day, a crimson glow always seemed to bathe the inside of the castle; making shadows stretch unnaturally, distorting them into dark, twisted reflects of what they once were. Howls could be heard periodically, as if a group of wolves, or some similar animal, were hunting inside the castle's walls.

The animated paintings that populated the place were either gone, burnt either partially or completely, or silent, having learnt that making noise was a bad idea, as it only served to draw the attention of the Dark Lady and Dark Lord that now called Hogwarts home, as well as their spawn. At first, many had openly insulted the teens, not willing to believe that two upstarts Dark Witch and Wizard would be all it would take to end Hogwarts' glorious history as a school, however the newcomers had shown little care, simply incinerating the portraits that caused too much of a ruckus.

A few had still managed to form something of a bond with the pair, even if said bond was weak at first, neither of the teens caring about what they were told to do, but at the very least they were polite when not angered, which was more that many of the living portraits could have hoped had Voldemort taken the school.

The ghosts were still there, tied to the place by their own choice, since they could not simply "up and leave", although they had become far more discreet after Peeves had been harshly punished for making the pair's son cry. The poltergeist still hadn't fully recovered, even now, ten years later, and he usually fled the pair whenever he could.

The creak of the large doors of the castle opening suddenly broke the silence, making the portraits closest to the entrance look at the gigantic doors in resignation. While the last person to enter the castle had only done so a few months earlier, it had been a mad wizard worshipping the Twin Ones as they called them, and he had been killed swiftly. There had been times when people entering the castle hadn't been killed, but they were rather rare.

"Run, whoever you are!" hissed one of the portraits, a young woman in a Victorian dress, as she glanced around fearfully. "They'll kill you!"

The intruder ignored the woman, as he knew perfectly well that his entrance had not gone unnoticed. In fact, he had expected it, and even counted on it.

"What are you doing here?" asked a voice, making the man turn and look into the twin green eyes of Harry Potter.

Reaching for his hood, the man took it off, showing unkempt raven hair, and a face startlingly similar to the one of James Potter.

"Hello, Harry." smiled Sirius Potter.

 **-Break-**

Sirius was tired. It had been over a decade since his family had been killed, he himself had only been spared because he had been blasted into a table and then carried out by another student, while his brother had proceeded to kill off the entire student population of the castle. He had hated his brother for what he had done, for taking his family from him, but he knew that if one really wanted to push the blame on someone, then they had to do it on those responsible for Harry and Alma's states. Still, his hatred had not abated in the slightest, even with that knowledge, and he had often tried to sneak into Hogwarts during the last decade, however each time he had approached the castle, he had been Stunned by a team of Ministry Aurors, and dragged back to Potter Manor.

As things were, the Ministry had decided that as the last Potter, and the Boy-Who-Lived, Sirius was too precious to allow to come to risk, and as such had several Aurors to keep an eye on him at all times. No matter what he did, he was eventually caught and dragged away from the only place he wanted to go to but wasn't allowed to. He knew that he stood no chance against Harry, he had seen firsthand what he could do, and if he and his girlfriend could take on a team of experienced Aurors and Unspeakables, the odds of him succeeding at eliminating them were so low they might as well not exist. He didn't care, however. All he wanted to do was to face his twin one last time, and either be killed, or to kill him.

It wasn't as if he had anything to love anymore anyway, all of his friends had been killed, as well as most teens around his age. The older wizards and witches saw him as nothing but a political pawn, and treated him like he was made of glass, giving him simpering lies every time they saw him. He was tired of this life, tired of merely _existing_.

He had planned for this day for the last six months, taking care to slip out of the Aurors' grasp, and, knowing that they would search him around Hogwarts first, he had waited until they had left to leave himself. He had also taken care to tag them with a spell that would attract every one of Hogsmeade's inhabitants should they set foot anywhere near the village, so he was certain to be left to his own devices.

And now, here he was, staring at his twin. He couldn't help but smile happily at the sight of the green-haired _freak_ his brother had become, since it meant he was _finally, finally_ going to be able to move on with his life…

 **-Break-**

Alma didn't even bother looking up when Harry entered the room, the both of them always knew where the other was, so it wasn't like she needed to show him she was aware of his presence. She was cradling their son in her arms, the baby with wide, orange eyes gurgling happily as it played with his mother's hair. One could wonder _why_ , after over a decade, the psychic's son was still a baby, but the truth was that he, like them, was dead, and only lived as an imprint of his former self.

When Alma and Harry had gone to recover their child from Armacham, they had made the mistake of thinking that the multinational corporation wouldn't dare harm their son, since he was too precious for their future research. They had been wrong. An old woman, dressed like someone fairly high-up in the hierarchy, had pointed a gun at the toddler, and told them to surrender, lest she kill their son. They hadn't listened.

Harry would never be able to forget the agonized scream of Alma, and his own, when they watched, frozen in shock, as Genevieve Aristide shot their son, a _baby_ , at point blank range, without so much as a twitch. He didn't remember much of what had happened afterwards, only that Alma and him had slaughtered the entirety of Armacham's forces, and had made sure that Genevieve Aristide was forever stuck in Limbo for what she had done. They had then come back to Hogwarts with the corpse of their son, and had used the ambient magic to power themselves up enough so that they could drag their baby's soul back from where it had disappeared when he had died.

They had taken the castle for themselves, as they felt they deserved it for suffering through lives that should never have been, lives they had lived only because people had been greedy and selfish. Well they could be as well, and had made sure that anyone intruding in their new home was properly punished for their actions.

 _How did it go?_ She asked, her mental voice brushing softly against Harry's mind.

 _He's dead. He wanted to kill me or die trying. He didn't suffer._

She nodded. Sirius was a victim, just as they had been, and it would have been unfair to make him suffer. Now that he was dead, they would hopefully be left alone. All they wanted was to be left in peace. Even if they were stuck on Earth until the end of time, they'd at least be able to _finally_ live free.

If it took murdering every single person that ever set foot in the castle, then so be it.


End file.
